The overarching goal of the study was to determine whether the audit requirements and financial reporting model found within ERISA adequately protect plan participants. As the report notes, "Audits are an important part of ERISA's financial reporting structure, yet their requirements, purpose, and benefits are often misunderstood." For instance, one ERISA requirement that's widely misunderstood is that auditors act on behalf of plan participants -- not the employers.

Council members heard testimony last summer, and also conducted their own research. Among the findings:

* Audit and/or auditor quality often was lacking, due to inadequate technical training and knowledge. As the report notes, "Retirement benefit plan financial statements and records are very different from those of public companies. Auditing them requires knowledge of how plans operate and their applicable, particularized rules."

* A division of the AICPA, the Employee Benefit Plan Audit Quality Center (EBPAQC), is dedicated to improving the quality of plan audits, and member firms must meet certain criteria. For instance, an audit partner must have firm-wide responsibility for the quality of the firm's benefit plan audit practice. Given this, the Council supports capitalizing on the existing structure of the EBPAQC.

* The Department of Labor, which oversees employee benefit plans, faces a number of challenges in its efforts to enforce auditor quality. Its authority over plan audits is "very circumscribed," and it has almost no authority over plan auditors, the report says.