auditability

The feasibility of undertaking auditing procedures. Auditability is the first of the *postulates of auditing elaborated by *Robert Khun Mautz and Hussein A. Sharaf: It is, in effect, the prerequisite to auditing. If all the records of a transaction-intensive organization were irrecoverably lost in a fire, for example, the organization would in all likelihood be unauditable. *Alternative procedures may be undertaken by the auditor in such circumstances (including the reconstruction of transactions by memory, or the confirmation of transactions by third parties), but it is highly unlikely that alternative procedures would lead to an *unqualified opinion in the context of complete destruction of records. In a less extreme scenario, questions of auditability can arise from (i) inadequate cooperation from *auditees and (ii) inadequate systems of internal control.