DCV obtains international certification in Internal Auditing

Nine people make up the Comptroller and Compliance Management of Depósito Central de Valores (DCV), which recently passed an ambitious quality certification process in charge of the Spanish Institute of Internal Auditors (IAIE), one of the world’s most prestigious certifying agencies in this field, earning the highest scores in most of the 50 evaluated areas, pursuant to which it earned the international certification from this institution for the next 5 years.

This was explained by the Comptroller and Compliance Manager of DCV, Jaime Fernández, who detailed that the area he leads reviews the internal control environment for all processes of the organization, “... i.e., whether the activities performed are carried out properly, whether they have been formalized and the risks have been identified, and whether they have proper controls. The idea is that, when developing an activity, risks must be investigated and assumed, and controls to properly mitigate them must be established. A risk is nothing but an event with a potential negative result. “

Given the specificity and uniqueness of its activity, DCV is constantly seeking and implementing global best practices and standards. Fernandez stated that “... although internal audits can be deemed as a supporting function for the Board’s decision making process and an area aimed at ensuring proper control over the company’s activities, it also develops an internal work. So, part of our work is having self-criticism and analyzing our work, the work of local and international entities and what the standards are, in order to adopt the best practices”.

International Certification from the Spanish Institute of Internal Auditors (IAIE)

Jaime Fernandez recalls that in pursuit of improvements for the area “we talked with several Chilean financial companies, and we also looked at what other depositories do, especially under ACSDA, the America’s Central Securities Depositories Association, investigating what it is and what they were doing, how they were doing it and evaluating several interesting things that we could incorporate, and the best way to test ourselves was trying to earn the international certification from a globally recognized and authorized entity to evaluate us and state whether we were complying with the world’s accepted international standards and rules on internal auditing”.

This area of DCV worked principally during the last 2 years in order to achieve this certification goal, but before, we were required to conduct a deep work, in order to reinforce the foundations of the activity; restructure it in terms of having the proper profiles and competencies; and redefining the area’s management, which also involves a cultural change that is not immediate, explained the executive.

The IAIE is the entity authorized worldwide by the Global Institute of Internal Auditors to grant the international certification in Latin America, which is recognized and accepted throughout the world.

“This certification of the process quality covers the entire internal auditing management, i.e., the internal auditing process, the people - in terms of their skills and knowledge - and also the culture that must exist in internal auditing. Hence, it is a comprehensive functional approach, and not only of the technical aspects of the activity”, he explained.

The challenges imposed by this new standard are to continue with the continuous improvement and to work with the efficiency that this function requires, focusing on the quality of its auditing process.

n Chile, there are a dozen local companies certified in internal auditing quality by the IAIE, which can be reviewed in the following link:

https://auditoresinternos.es/certificaciones/qa/qa-realizados

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