In the area of fraud or non-compliance cases, the general public’s opinion and expectations on the auditor might be vastly different. If the general public loses trust in the work done by the audit profession, investors may find it increasingly difficult to trust the audited firm. Many different attempts have been made to narrow the audit expectations gap. This paper investigates a way to ensure a full forensic audit is conducted if an organisation inhibits risks of fraud or non-compliance. The risk assesment is used as a tool for the auditors to improve the audit quality where necessary.

Research was done in a iterative process using the Saunders et al. Research Methodology Framework. The paper reviews the existing knowledge base on audit practices, contemporary standards in auditing in a global and local level. Further the paper explains the role and responsibility of auditors which may be different from the general public's expectations of what the auditors role is. Lastly, a questionnaire is designed to identify fraud or non-compliance risks within an organisation using the Hevner et al. Design Science for Information Systems methodology.

The client received a working prototype of an electronic questionnaire allowing a risk assessment of fraud or non-compliance risk in an audited organisation. The audit engagement team can use this questionnaire as an evaluation to involve forensic specialists to perform an in depth analysis of the auditees financial statements. This provides additional re-assurance in medium to high risk engagements. The succeeding work, if a forensic specialist is involved in the audit can contribute to decrease the audit expectation gap by identification of possible fraud or non-compliance cases within an organisation.