In lieu of the Supervisory Board, the Audit Committee performs the following tasks:
- Engaging in questions of accounting as well as supervising the accounting process; in this respect, the Committee will regularly have reported to it by the Management Board the effects of any new features of the accounting and reporting standards, especially IFRS, relevant to the Group or the Company; it may make recommendations or proposals for the safeguarding of the integrity of the accounting process;
- Discussing the quarterly financial reports and the half-yearly financial report as well as discussing the audit of the partial results;
- Supervising the year-end audit and determining the audit emphasis;
- Supervising and safeguarding the independency of the auditor during the performance of the audit as well as occupation with the additional services rendered by the auditor; the rendering of not prohibited non-audit services by the auditor and his network to the Company or a company of the Group requires the prior approval of the Audit Committee; the Audit Committee may issue guidelines for the rendering of such services;
- Conduction of tender and selection processes for auditor assignments in accordance with the legal provisions for the external rotation of the auditor, in particular articles 16 et seq. of the EU regulation on auditors (Regulation (EU) no. 537/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 April 2014 on specific requirements regarding statutory audit of public-interest entities and repealing Commission Decision 2005/909/EC.);
- Engaging in questions of group tax planning;
- Engaging with the report by the Management Board on donations.
In addition, the Audit Committee shall perform preparatory work for the Supervisory Board and issue resolutions proposals. The preparatory work of the Audit Committee comprises the following tasks:
- Questions of risk management and supervising the efficacy of the risk management system;
- Supervising the efficacy of the internal audit system, internal control systems as well as so-called "anti-fraud"-measures;
- Questions of Compliance and supervising the Compliance Management System within the Group;
- Examining the annual and the consolidated financial statements including the respective management reports on the basis of the results of the audit and the supplementary explanations by the auditor and the evaluation of the audit reports as well as the examination of the proposal of the Management Board with regard to the appropriation of the balance sheet profit and
- as the case may be, examining the dependency report;
- Proposal of the Supervisory Board to the Annual General Meeting as regards the election of the auditor as well as the placement of the audit assignment with the auditor and concluding the audit fee agreement; with respect to the recommendation of the Audit Committee as regards the election of the auditor the provisions of art. 16 para. 2 of the EU regulation on auditors must be observed;
Medium-term plan and annual budget for the Group.
Members
Karin Dohm (Chairwoman)
Sylvia Woelke (Deputy Chairwoman)
Claudia Plath
Dr. Florian Funck
Ludwig Glosser
Rainer Kuschewski