Anderson became Accenture.

Any ideas for Price Waterhouse's new name ?

I think they should fry. Auditors are there to audit - not just take a large payout and rubber-stamp the data presented to them.

For some time now I've been arguing that accountancy and auditors are the cause of a number of high profile frauds. Were I PM then I would declare accountancy an illegal practice and give accountants a chance to repent, beg forgiveness and be rehabilitated into society. Those who refuse get burned at the stake. With potential troubles over gas supplies this could be the answer...

Anderson's consulting division was spun off and became Accenture before Anderson went down - it was hardly as a result of the later scandals - lucky for Accenture. Wikipedia will fill in the details for you.

It is not right to place the blame with the auditors *yet*. If they have screwed up this part of the audit, or if there has been collusion (the wording of the article seems to strongly suggest this, but the details probably won't come out for a while) the PwC firm in India will very likely go down, as it really is a fundamental part of the work, and the Parmalat and Nick Leeson scandals have illustrated some of the risks of fraud in this area.

On a more pedantic note, 'Price Waterhouse' hasn't been the name of PwC since 1998 and the merger with C&L, so you may wish to check your facts before making sarcy comments.

As the article refers to the World Bank ban on Wipro, have attached a couple of links that provide more details.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Infotech/ITeS/Premji_clears_stand_to_boost_staff_morale/articleshow/3974822.cms

http://specials.rediff.com/money/2009/jan/13slide1-why-world-bank-wipro-kept-quiet.htm

It should be noted that the companies in each country/territory are seperate legal entities that subscribe into a central corporation that controls branding and a few other things.

However you can be certain that the Indian partners will be getting a kicking from the partners in UK/US/Canda/Australia and Europe already, and it may just be the saving of more than one or two jobs in these countries...

The auditor's only defense against illegal colusion is that of incompetance. I wonder which they'll go for? There will have to be sacrifical lamb or two regardless, then fingers crossed the whole ediface doesn't come tumbling down.

You are more knowledgable - however, I don't think there are any factual errors - let's take a look:

"Anderson became Accenture." - TRUE

"Any ideas for Price Waterhouse's new name ?" - A QUESTION, not a fact/statement. OK, the new name would have been PriceWaterhouseCooper or PWC, I was after suggestions if they indeed had to rename because of a scandal.

"I think they should fry." - A clearly stated OPINION

"Auditors are there to audit - not just take a large payout and rubber-stamp the data presented to them." - TRUE

No intent to be scary - I just think Auditors should audit, not just trust the people who produce the accounts and take their fee. Some make life easy so that they can be appointed the next year - it appears to me there is something wrong with this arrangement.

I have worked with E&Y on forensic activities after a company went into administration - amazingly, the auditors were also being looked into in that case as well as it was all a bit of a surprise. The work the forensic accountants do is excellent but, I'm afraid, all a little bit too late.

Although it remains to be determined whether or not PwC deliberately turned a blind eye to the fraud or were genuinely misled, the fact is that large accountancies charge something like a million pounds a day in fee's for what? In essence to provide assurance to the shareholders that whatever the execs in a company are declaring is true.

Either way its a big failure on behalf of PwC and it has tarnished their reputation significantly.

It's spelt sarky.

Anderson *Consulting* became Accenture, Anderson the accounting firm existed as a separate entity. PwC Consulting was sold to IBM at the beginning of the decade (following the 'Monday' debacle). I am not challenging your opinions, the two minor inaccuracies in quick succession caught my eye is all. /pedant mode

Accounting firms are subject to an 'expectation gap' over what the general public and even those who are moderately familiar with finance believe the purpose of audit to be and what it actually is. Giving 'assurance' is unfortunately not guaranteed to discover fraud (although it sometimes does), hence the growth in services like forensic accounting over recent years.

Even if there is evidence of auditor collusion or (criminal?) negligence, it will be interesting to see how this pans out for PwC globally - after all this is what happened in PwC in Japan a few years ago and that incident doesn't seem to have had global consequences for the brand.

Having trained as an auditor in the aftermath of Enron, it boggles the mind that a proper audit could have missed a cash fraud on this scale though, so I suspect spectacular negligence or collusion will be the eventual answer.