Having had much personal experience working with auditors from China, I can attest that I have not found a 'good auditor' there yet. In fact I haven't found an honest auditor or an auditor that was not corrupt from China and this includes my work with auditors from one of the Big 4, whom I will not name here. In fact the last auditor from China that I spoke with threatened my life, so take that as you will.

I suspect that there could be an exception that makes the rule that 'Good Auditor' is an oxymoron in China, however I have not found a good auditor yet. It was definitely not for a lack of trying on my part. In fact if anyone knows a good auditor form Hong Kong Revenue, I would very much appreciate an introduction as I would like to help HK Revenue with a little issue of back taxes. :)

Now I was reading a very funny article (true story from Oddly Enough at Reuters: Auditor a glutton for punishment) about a 25 year old auditor for the Chinese Government. He was working for a department that was supposed to be responsible for cleaning up business and thus he was to audit businesses and department and root out corruption. Some of the obvious requirements for the job included not wining and dining with the companies or groups under audit so as to remain separate from those groups and not suffer influence.

Now this young auditor trying to live up to the requirements of the job, FAILED MISERABLY. And I emphasize this as his failure sent him to an early grave. Now he was not murdered or anything that violent even though it is possible for auditors to be put in dangerous situations as I can attest. No this young auditor decided to accept the invitations to wine and dine and he died by eating and drinking himself to death on the dime of his audit targets. Not only was he not cleaning up the corruption he drowned in it and his vice killed him.

It gets even more surreal. The group of auditors that he worked with decided to take some time to grieve his death. They did this by going on a couple month tour of the country side where they might enjoy some massage parlors. Obviously they shirked the option to buckle down and get to work and prove their department was not as corrupt as the dead auditor. They instead bring into question their own integrity.

Good luck finding a good auditor in China!

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