Empanelment with Bank of Maharashtra for Concurrent/Revenue audit

BANK OF MAHARASHTRA invites applications from practicing firms of Chartered Accountants within India, in the prescribed format, who are willing to have their firms empaneled as Concurrent Auditors/Revenue Auditors of the Bank for specified branches for FY 2022-23.

NOTIFICATION FOR CHARTERED ACCOUNTANT

BANK OF MAHARASHTRA invites applications from practicing firms of Chartered Accountants within India, in the prescribed format, who are willing to have their firms empaneled as Concurrent Auditors/Revenue Auditors of the Bank for specified branches for FY 2022-23.

Following are the terms and conditions for applying for empanelment of Concurrent Auditor in Bank of Maharashtra for the period April 2022 to March 2023 and Revenue Auditor for the period October 2021 to September 2022

I. Mandatory Conditions for Appointment —

1. Applicant should be either a Partnership or a Limited Liability Partnership or Proprietorship Firm or a Company, already in the panel of the R.B.I., which is circulated among Banks for Statutory Audit of Banks from time to time. Registration of Firm with RBI is mandatory. The Category of the Audit Firm (viz. I, II, Ill, IV) should be mentioned.

2. Those Audit firms which are conducting Concurrent Audit of our branches continuously for a period of THREE years or THREE terms are not eligible for re-empanelment for the year 2022-23.

3. Empanelment and allocation of branches to the auditors will be purely the prerogative of the Bank. Such empanelment shall be initially for a period of one year and can be extended up to a maximum period of 3 years subject to satisfactory performance of the auditor.

4. The Concurrent Audit firm will undertake that they will not sub contract the audit assignment under any pretext/ in any form. The audit report needs to be signed by the officials mentioned in the online applications.

5. Auditors should not have been disqualified under Section 143 of the Companies Act, 2013 to accept this appointment.

6. The Concurrent Audit firm / or the partners/ or directors/ or any of their clients should not have any credit facilities with the auditee branch for which they are applying for except credit facilities against their own deposits.

7. The Firm / any partners / Directors of the Firm / Company / LLP / Proprietor should not have Statutory Audit, Credit Audit, Valuation of Fixed / Current assets or any other similar assignments with any branch of Bank of Maharashtra.

8. The firms should be having sufficient experience in conducting audits in Banks / our Bank. Other things being equal, the Audit firms with Proprietor / Partner with CISA / DISA qualification will be given preference. Weightage will be given to a firm having exposure in conducting concurrent audit of the Bank Branches for public sector / major private sector banks.

9. The firm should have necessary office set up and adequate personnel to ensure proper deployment and timely completion of the assignments. Weightage would be given to the CA firms where the partners themselves are ex-bankers or the firm(s) has got tie- up with ex-bankers with requisite experience and exposure.

10. Only one branch will be allotted to Selected Firm. However, the Bank has trio discretion to change the allocation of branches based on any administrative exigencies.

11. Whenever any of the Proprietor / Partner / Director of the Audit Firm / Company is related to any of the employees / Directors of the Bank, the relationship with such employees / Directors should be specifically mentioned in the application.

12. The Bank has the discretion to consider or reject any of the applications based on any of the RBI / Government / Internal guidelines of the Bank, without assigning any reasons.

13. Only the Audit Firm provisionally selected for empanelment will be communicated through email. No individual intimation will be sent to the audit firm whose application is not considered for empanelment. No further correspondence will be entertained in this regard.

14. The Audit Firms should give their consent in writing in the prescribed format agreeing to comply with and bound by the terms and conditions prescribed by the Bank after allotment of assignment as a concurrent Auditor.

15. The Audit firm selected is eligible for reappointment subject to Annual Review by the Bank up to a maximum period of 3 Terms / 3 Years. Reappointment may be to the same branch or to any other branch at the discretion of the Bank.

16. The Audit Firm shall submit the reports in the prescribed format covering all the Audit areas advised from time to time.

17. If selected for empanelment, the Audit firm shall submit an undertaking for ensuring compliance of “Dos and DON’Ts” on the prescribed lines at the time of assignment.

18. The assignment should be carried out in a professional manner and in case of any misconduct or negligence; the Bank is free to report the matter at any time to ICAI / RBI. This will be in addition to the disengagement from the Concurrent Audit assignment.

19. The firm should execute undertaking of fidelity and secrecy on its letter head in the format prescribed by the Bank at the time of appointment.

20. If any partner of a Chartered Accountant firm is a Director on the Board of a bank, no partner of the same firm should be appointed as concurrent auditor in the bank.

21. The monthly/quarterly fees payable to the auditors shall be approved by the delegated authority taking into consideration the nature of assignment and within the maximum fees approved by ACB of the Bank.

22. The firm should give UDIN number for each report.

23. Concurrent Auditors of the Entity should not be considered for appointment as SCAs/SAs of the same Entity.

24. No auditor will be allowed to leave the audit in-between the term of contract, failing which monetary penalty of one month’s remuneration will be recovered. Fees payable for concurrent audit of April 2022 will be retained by Zonal Offices and the same will be released at the end of assignment, along with the audit fees of March 2023.  If the auditor leaves the assignment in between, the retained fee will be forfeited as penalty.

II. Methodology of Selection —

1.  For Concurrent Audit

The eligible interested individuals / Firms / LLPs / Companies should apply online only through the link provided on the bank’s website i.e. www.bankofmaharashtra.in during the stipulated period only i.e. from 14.03.2022 (10.00 AM) to 17.03.2022 (5.00 PM). They should not send the hardcopy of the application / annexures to the Bank without being called for. No correspondence / communication from the applying Firms will be entertained by the Bank whatsoever till the Bank communicates selection to them (if selected).

The applicant has to necessarily furnish his choice of 3 branches in descending order in the application in the website.

An acknowledgement number for each completed application will be generated and the same will be displayed in the website immediately after submitting the application. This shall serve as a future reference number for the Bank / applicant. The applicant can take printout of the completed / submitted application along with the acknowledgement number for reference.

The applications received by the Bank would be screened by a Committee of Executives constituted for this purpose, which will consider empanelment of CA firms based on their experience, CISA / DISA qualifications, number of staff members employed, number of partners, seniority etc. and any other factor considered necessary by the Committee for which the decision of the Committee shall be final.

For specialized branches/ offices i.e. TIBD, SWIFT, De Mat Cell, Credit Card Cell, DCRD, CBS-PMO, Data Centers, Services Branches, Head Office – Verticals/Cells, CPCs, etc. required qualifications in that particular area & past experience in auditing such verticals, will be taken into account during allotment.

Merely meeting the eligibility criteria shall not automatically entitle the firm for empanelment. After empanelment, the work will be allotted as and when need arises at the sole discretion of the Bank. The empanelment will not give any right to the empaneled firms for carrying out the assignments. The Bank reserves its right to cancel any or all the offers without assigning any reason whatsoever.

The appointment / allotment of branches shall be based on the availability of branches and number of Audit Firms in a particular area. The Bank reserves the right to appoint any Audit Firm for Concurrent Audit.

Based on the above, the Audit Firm will be provisionally selected for empanelment. Bank shall communicate the provisional selection to such Firms by way of email / letter and call for the hard copies of the application, letter of acceptance and other documents to be received by the Bank before the specified due dates. After receipt of this communication the Audit firm should send the hard copy of the application and copies of registration certificate issued by ICAI, proof of UCN registration issued by RBI etc. within the specified date.

After receipt of hard copy of the application, letter of acceptance and other documents from the Firms; the Bank will empanel the Audit Firm for Concurrent Audit for the period from 01/04/2022 to 31/03/2023 subject to correctness of the information furnished in the application / annexures.

If the selected Firm has not sent hard copies of the application and other details and letter of acceptance duly signed by them within the due date, the provisional selection will stand automatically cancelled. No separate intimation in this regard will be communicated.

In respect of Firms which are not being selected, no communication will be sent by the Bank and no correspondence will be communicated.

2. For Revenue Audit –

In respect of Firms which are not being selected for Concurrent Audit for the year 2022-23, they will be eligible for Revenue Audit assignment, for the period 01/10/2021 to 30/09/2022.  Based on Bank’s requirement, firms will be selected for Revenue Audit work and allotment will be made in October/November 2022.

Link to Apply for For Empanelment of Concurrent Auditors/Revenue Auditors(Chartered Accountant)