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Independence is the cornerstone of the auditing profession. Even so, it is often assumed that acquiescing to the audit client when a disagreement occurs is more beneficial to the auditor-client relationship than asserting one’s independence (e.g., see Wang & Tuttle, 2009). We look more closely at the issue in the context of auditor-client management disagreements as recalled by experienced auditors.

We find that for most disagreements in which the auditor did not make any concession at all, the auditor-client relationship was either unaffected or strengthened. We find that a client’s use of pressure tactics did not appear to influence whether or not the auditor made a concession, but that a client’s use of pressure tactics, was associated with damage to the auditor-client relationship. The importance of the issue causing a disagreement was positively associated with the likelihood of the auditor staying with his/her initial position.

We examine experimentally the extent to which three potential tax authority interventions encourage the reporting of tax fraud to tax authorities and how two types of guilt feelings are involved in this decision. Using a sample of 728 adult taxpayers in the United States, we find that a cash award, a prosocial award and a moral suasion message positively influence whistleblowing intentions and that the moral suasion effect is mediated by intrapsychic guilt (when an individual violates their moral values) and interpersonal guilt (when one's actions cause harm to another). The combination of a cash award and moral suasion message results in the greatest likelihood of tax whistleblowing. Our research contributes to the tax whistleblowing literature by providing evidence of the efficacy of potential interventions and also extends literature on the role of moral emotions by showing the relevance of intrapsychic and interpersonal guilt to the tax fraud reporting decision.