Gallup Poll: Accounting's Image Recovers
Noting "a significant increase" over the last year in the positive image of most segments of American business and industry, Princeton, N.J.-based Gallup pollsters say the public's image rating of accounting has jumped 14 points compared to last August.
Overall, Gallup said, the computer industry continues to be the highest rated of any industry tested in Gallup's assessment of industry images, followed by the restaurant and grocery businesses. The three industries with the most negative images of those tested include the oil and gas industry, healthcare, and the legal field.
"The one industry whose image has improved the most compared to last year is accounting," Gallup said. Accounting rose from a net rating of 0 percent last year, when as many people gave it a negative rating as a positive one, to a positive 31 percent this year. "This obviously represents a significant improvement," Gallup said, noting, at the same time, that the industry has still not recovered to the positive 39 percent rating it received in 2001, in the pre-Enron era.
Other industry sectors whose positive images have risen significantly compared to last year include healthcare, the telephone industry, the legal field, pharmaceuticals, advertising and public relations, and the sports industry. (Many of these remain near the bottom of the image list, despite their relative gains.)
Only two sectors have slightly lower image ratings this year than they did last year: the retail industry, and farming and agriculture, both of which dropped by 3 points.
Perhaps more importantly, there are no industries rated this year whose images are nearly as negative as several measured in the 2001 survey. At that point, the oil and gas industry had a negative 30 percent rating, and the legal field and electric and gas utilities had negative 16 mpercent ratings.
Child Tax Credit Drives Traffic to IRS
Nielsen//NetRatings reports that traffic to the U.S. Department of Treasury jumped 77 percent during the week ending July 27. With the first set of refund checks mailed out on July 25, surfers from home logged on to check the status of their refunds. Traffic to the U.S. Department of Treasury jumped from 742,000 surfers during the week ending July 20, to more than 1.3 million unique visitors during the week ending July 27. More than 65 percent of the site’s audience visited the IRS Web page containing information about the Child Tax Credit Refund.
Oklahoma State Web Site Launches Online Services for Accountants
The Oklahoma Accountancy Board has launched an online service for accountants to apply for certification examinations and renew their professional licenses and permits. The new suite of services also allows the public to search for licensed accountants across the state. more at www.youroklahoma.com.
Despite One-Year Reprieve, Most Companies Hew to Sarbanes-Oxley Schedule
Most U.S. multinational companies are moving ahead with preparations for compliance with internal financial control provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, even though implementation of the provisions has been delayed by a year, according to PricwwaterhouseCoopers. And, more than a third are moving faster than required and are either planning or considering compliance for fiscal 2003, a year early, the firm says based on a survey. According to the survey, 60 percent of senior executives said their company plans to retain their original schedule for most Sarbanes-Oxley Section 404 preparation, despite the extension, while 37 percent said they would need more time. In addition, 76 percent are reporting that audit committees are expecting more extensive testing now.
