Recently published academic research suggests there is indeed a detriment to audit quality when audit firms hold long tenures on audit engagements.
“We find that longer audit firm tenure leads to less timely discovery and correction of misstatements, which is consistent with a negative effect of long auditor tenure on audit quality,” write authors Zvi Singer of HEC Montreal and Jing Zhang of the University of Alabama in Huntsville. “This finding speaks to the benefit of a fresh look by a new auditor.”
