What are internal control questionnaires????

Typical questions in an ICQ would be:

1 Are all overtime payments authorised by managers?
2 Are purchase invoices cancelled after payment?
3 Are bank reconciliations carried out every month?

These are questions that the audit team have to answer by finding sufficient appropriate audit evidence such as inspecting times sheets for authorisation. ‘Yes’ answers mean that the operation of the internal control has been shown to be effective.

Correct. However, he important thing is not the answers required, but the nature of the questions. An ICQ asks very specific questions about specific control procedures. An ICEQ asks higher level questions and attacks control objectives.

So, the control objective is:

Can overtime be paid without authorisation? [we want the answer ‘No’ for good control]

Investigating control procedures could include:

Are all overtime payments authorised by the employee’s manager?
Are overtime payments forbidden?
Are overtime payments authorised by the chief accountant?

In each case we want the answer ‘Yes’ to indicate good control. Note the a control objective can be met by several different control procedures.

Using ICEQs is more skilled, leaving it up to the auditor to determine if the objective has been met. ICQ’s are much more cut and dried and could be completed by a less skilled person.