In a statement issued today, the SC said that Ong & Wong Chartered Accountants (Ong & Wong) as well as auditors Ong Koon Liang, Ong Kong Lai and Wong Cham Mew will also be prohibited from scheduling funds for a 12-month period from Sept 7, this year.

The audit oversight board of the SC imposed fines amounting to RM331,000 on Ong & Wong as well as the three individuals.

The accounting firm was fined RM227,000 while the two Ongs have to pay RM35,000 each and Wong has to pay RM34,000.

It said that based on its audit inquiry findings, the firm and the audit partners had breached the relevant International Standards on Auditing (ISA) and International Standard of Quality Control (ISQC) when auditing two public interest entities.

“The audit oversight board found numerous audit deficiencies in the engagement reviews of the two public interest entities that were led by Koon Liang and Kong Lai respectively as the engagement partners,” the SC said.

“These deficiencies, among others, relate to the sufficiency and appropriateness of the audit evidence obtained and the completeness of audit documentation to support the conclusions reached,” it said.

It also found that in one of the entities whose subsidiaries operate abroad, the reliability of documents and the audit team’s control over trade receivables confirmation were in contravention of the ISA.

It said Wong, who is the engagement quality control reviewer for both entities, had failed to sufficiently review the selected documentation relating to significant judgements and risk areas of the engagement as well as the basis of the conclusions.

It said those shortcomings affected the overall audit quality as evident in the multiple audit deficiencies discovered in the two audits performed.