Audit, Compliance and Risk Blog

Does your organization have a formal workplace violence prevention policy? Requirements that employers protect their employees against workplace violence are expanding throughout North America.  For example, public agencies in New York have been required to do so since 2009 (S 6441), and most employers in Ontario have required the same since 2010 (Bill 168), while Manitoba revised longstanding requirements in 2011. 

For nearly 50 years, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has prohibited “employment” discrimination based on any of several characteristics, including “sex” (gender). In 1964, Congress was essentially concerned with gender-specific jobs, pay discrimination for jobs performed by both genders, and male supervisors abusing their female subordinates by demanding sexual favors, among other abuses.

The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) is in the final stages of updating its generally accepted auditing standards (GAAS) for financial statement audits of companies in the United States that are not subject to the rules and regulations established by the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB). Several years ago the AICPA decided its auditing standards should be updated to make them clearer, and at the same time strive to conform them to the standards issued by the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board.

The current rules for lease accounting in the United States go back to 1976 and have been interpreted, modified, amended, and revised numerous times over the years. The existing U.S. accounting standard is complex and, some say, arbitrary because it allows companies to structure transactions to meet the rules of the standard, and helps keep significant liabilities off their balance sheet.

Latest Congressional Action on Securities | JOBS Act Loosens Regulation on Smaller Companies  Securities requirements in the United States tend to ebb and flow, so that a period of increasing restrictions is followed by a decade of loosening restrictions. Congress propels these changes as lawmakers respond to market needs and political tides. April 2012 marks the latest change, as the imaginatively named Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act (JOBS) introduces legislation that allows small companies to grow before having to register securities or stage an initial public offering (IPO). The JOBS Act also reduces reporting requirements for up to five years after an IPO. These opportunities include:

When two parties in a claim cannot agree, appraisal is often the quickest and fairest method of determining loss value.  But if the appraisers are not able to agree on the value they can choose an umpire to help resolve the dispute, after which an award can be paid out.  But in innumerable cases the parties refuse to accept a win, and insist on moving for a new trial to appeal the case.

STP author Barry Zalma is featured in a new series on the Web-based television news network World Risk and Insurance News (WRIN.tv). The series, launched in January, is called Who Got Caught? It focuses on the apprehension of perpetrators of fraud, from healthcare and workers’ compensation fraud, to murder for life insurance, arson for profit, and more.

FACEBOOK, MYSPACE, TWITTER AND BLOGS:  HOW TO MANAGE SOCIAL MEDIA AT WORK.  A recent article in the Globe and Mail described how Canadians spend on average approximately 43.5 hours a month on the Web, which is, according to data released by a Web research firm comScore, almost twice the worldwide average of 23.1 hours.(1)

The most recent update of STP's OSHA Compliance: A Simplified National Guide alerts readers to OSHA’s new “Enforcement Procedures for Investigating or Inspecting Workplace Violence Incidents” at nursing and personal care facilities.  The Procedures are effective September 11. OSHA has long had numerous prevention guidelines targeted to employers whose establishments are likely to be at highest risk for workplace violence, and some states have issued more detailed guidance to complement OSHA’s efforts, focusing on planning, facility design, and employee training.