Identification And Evaluation Of Audit Risk In Projects Financed From European Funds

The audit of projects financed from European Structural Funds is a requirement expressly stipulated under financing contracts and supposes a series of activities, such as: - the analysis and verification of the nature, legality, accuracy and eligibility of expenses; - the verification of using the amounts received in advance; - the audit of third parties’ accounts; - the comparison of the expenses with specially assigned accounts and the project budget; - the verification of project incomes (inclusively of the advances received from the financer, interests to the advances and other incomes generated by the project), etc. Understanding the entity and its environment, inclusively its internal control proves to be an essential element in the diligent approach of the audit that should be followed by the understanding of the project financed from European Structural Funds and especially of its finality. The application of the procedures imposed by the international audit standards shall not fully eliminate the audit risk and especially the risk of fraud and errors. The auditors have used as a research method both the theoretical approach and the empiric research. In the theoretical approach have been analyzed the notions of audit risk, fraud and errors in accordance with the applicable legislation, and empiric because certain fraud cases frequently encountered in the development of project financed from European Structural Funds in Romania are presented.