Internal Control in support of External Control: the principles of COSO in the Autonomous Department of Water and Sewage of Araraquara-SP

Abstract

The public sector internal controls pursue to ensure the organizational objectives achievement of: operational activities efficiency, public assets protection, information reliability and transparency, and adherence to rules and legislation. Among these objectives is also included the constitutional obligation of internal control to support external control, exercised by the Legislative Power, with the help of the Courts of Auditors. The present work aims to evaluate the performance of the Autonomous Department of Water and Sewage of Araraquara-SP internal control system (ICS) regarding adherence to the 13 principles defined by the integrated structure of internal controls of Committe of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO, 2013). This is an exploratorydescriptive research, with a qualitative approach to the primary data collected. The methodological procedures were applied through documentary research on the legislation and inspection reports and sentences issued by the Sao Paulo State Court of Auditors (COASP), on the entity under study accounts, between 2010 and 2020. Data processing took place through content analysis of sentences between 2016 and 2020, a period in which internal control was addressed, and the findings were categorized by components of the COSO model. As a result, it was identified that the autarchy initially, between 2016 and 2018, did not adequately support external control and that there was little adherence to the COSO principles, however, from 2019 and 2020, there was an evolution in compliance with the COA-SP notes and the gradual adoption of the COSO. The main improvements observed were: increase in the resolution of COA-SP audit finding monitored and resolved by the Autarchy; reduction in the number of COA-SP finding; ICS reporting improvements; greater use of ICS recommendations by COA- SP; and strengthening accountability.