January 29, 2016, letter commenting on the AICPA's November 2015 Exposure Draft, "Improving Transparency and Effectiveness of Peer Review"

This letter provides the U.S. Government Accountability Office's (GAO) comments on the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants' (AICPA) exposure draft entitled Improving Transparency and Effectiveness of Peer Review. GAO promulgates generally accepted government auditing standards, which provide professional standards for auditors of government entities in the United States. GAO supports the AICPA's initiatives to enhance the peer review process by incorporating best practices of effective peer reviewers into the peer review standards and improving audit performance. We believe that the proposed changes to standards for performing and reporting on peer reviews would mitigate many of the issues identified by the AICPA in its recent analysis of matters for further consideration in peer review engagements.