Ethics for Connecticut CPAs – 4 Hours

A CPA is challenged in today’s work world not only to serve a client or employer, but also to protect the public interest by ensuring transparency in financial reporting and the fair administration of the tax laws. In balancing those two duties, a CPA can find themselves in a genuine ethical dilemma.

This four-hour course works through that tension in three stages. Part I sets out the ethical frameworks that underpin professional judgment — consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics — and shows how a CPA’s conclusion can shift depending on which lens is applied. Part II turns to the rules themselves: the AICPA Code of Professional Conduct alongside Chapter 389 of the Connecticut General Statutes, which establishes the State Board of Accountancy, the licensing framework and the standards of professional conduct expected of Connecticut licensees. Part III closes with putting ethics into action — the rationalizations that precede misconduct, the warning signs of an organization on the verge of ethical collapse, and what it takes to rebuild moral character after a lapse.

The Connecticut material covers the composition and regulatory powers of the Board and its authority to investigate complaints, together with the disciplinary consequences that follow a violation. It works through the rules that carry the most practical weight for a Connecticut licensee: which firms must hold a permit to practise and which out-of-state firms are exempt; the prohibition on issuing reports or rendering attest or compilation services without a valid licence; practice privileges and substantial equivalency for CPAs licensed elsewhere; continuing education and the three-year quality review; the confidentiality of client information and its exceptions; the ownership of working papers and the obligation to return original client records; the restrictions on contingent fees, commissions and referral fees under sections 20-281l and 20-281m; and the grounds on which a certificate, licence, permit or practice privilege may be revoked or suspended.

On the AICPA side, the course works through integrity and objectivity, independence and the seven threats framework, subordination of judgment, conflicts of interest, knowing misrepresentation, client advocacy, confidential client information, records requests, and acts discreditable to the profession.

Throughout, the material is built on case studies drawn from real events, including WorldCom, HealthSouth, the fraud at Buca Inc., the 2007–2010 mortgage crisis, Toronto-Dominion Bank, the Scott London insider-trading case at KPMG, and the embezzlement at Collin Street Bakery, alongside hypothetical fact patterns set in Connecticut practice.

An appendix reproduces the source law in full: Chapter 389 of the Connecticut General Statutes.

Learning objectives

Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:

1. Apply the ethics of professional accounting as CPAs through the analysis of case studies involving both actual situations and hypothetical facts.
2. Apply ethical judgment in interpreting the rules and determining the public interest, recognising that the public interest should be placed ahead of self-interest even at the cost of a job or a client.
3. Analyze and apply the AICPA Code of Professional Conduct and the Connecticut law that pertains to CPAs licensed to practise in the state of Connecticut, including the Connecticut General Statutes and Code of Professional Conduct and the policies adopted by the Board currently in effect.
4. Determine the course of action that would uphold the intent of the rules in the performance of professional accounting services, rather than mere technical compliance with those rules.
5. Determine how the rules apply across different practice settings, including CPAs who provide assurance, attest or compilation services and CPAs who provide tax services.