Procurement Practices and the Municipality Auditing Market

44 Pages Posted: 14 Jan 2016 Last revised: 10 May 2017

See all articles by Ana Cristina Marques

Ana Cristina Marques

Norwich Business School - University of East Anglia

Ana Calado Pinto

University Institute of Lisbon (IUL) - CIES-IUL, ISCTE (Centre for Research and Studies in Sociology)

Date Written: January 13, 2017

Abstract

In this article we study the determinants of (i) audit services’ public procurement criteria, and (ii) the audit fees of Portuguese municipalities. Our dataset is unique, resulting from merging new survey data with data that is not usually publicly available. We find that the majority of municipalities acquire auditing services based upon the lowest price selection criterion. However, this practice is less frequent in municipalities with higher public procurement sophistication and with higher political competition. Our analysis of the audit fees charged indicate these are higher in municipalities with more sophisticated procurement processes, higher political competition, and more citizens’ interest. Audit fess are also lower in municipalities with an internal auditing office.

Keywords: local government, political competition, lowest price selection criterion, audit fees

JEL Classification: M41, M42

Suggested Citation

Marques, Ana Cristina and Pinto, Ana Calado, Procurement Practices and the Municipality Auditing Market (January 13, 2017). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2715556 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2715556

Ana Cristina Marques (Contact Author)

Norwich Business School - University of East Anglia ( email )

Norwich
NR4 7TJ
United Kingdom

Ana Calado Pinto

University Institute of Lisbon (IUL) - CIES-IUL, ISCTE (Centre for Research and Studies in Sociology) ( email )

Av. das Forças Armadas
Av. Professor Anibal Bettencourt
Lisbon, 1649-026
Portugal

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