Price war breaks out among Cyprus auditors

An intense and at times “ugly” price war seems to have erupted among auditors in Cyprus in their quest to maintain market share faced with demands for cost savings by clients, big and small.
The undeclared war is probably one of the biggest challenges the new leadership of the Association of Certified Public Accounts of Cyprus (ICPAC) will be faced with after Wednesday’s 48th AGM elects a new board.
Reliable sources have told the Financial Mirror that in most likelihood, the Chairman of the new board will be Nicos Syrimis (KPMG) who will be called to restore order among the member firms undercutting each other.
The Financial Mirror has learned that auditors are willing to undercut for big as well as small accounts. A senior official from one of the ‘Big 4’ firms – (PwC, Deloitte, KPMG and Ernst & Young) said that he quoted a price of EUR 5000 for a renewal contract that last year was billed at EUR 4700, but the business was lost as a competitor bid EUR 3500 and got the contract.

(see full story in print/PDF versions)