The Relationship Between Internal Auditing and External Audit Fees: Evidence from Kuwait

Abstract

Although audit pricing has been one of the most studied topics in the audit literature for more than three decades now, to date, very little research has been conducted on this important issue in the Middle East Region. One important question in this line of audit research has been related to whether audit fees are influenced by the contribution of client’s internal auditing (IA) to the external audit work. Much of existing research investigating this issue has been conducted in well-developed English-speaking countries, with almost no empirical evidence provided about this issue within the context of other parts of the world. The purpose of the current study is to examine this issue using data from the Kuwaiti audit market. In particular, the current study uses a sample of audit engagements performed in the Kuwaiti market, to examine whether external audit fees are influenced by the contribution of the client’s internal audit function. The results show that IA contribution in the external audit work is negatively related to the amount of external audit fees.