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At the time mentioned, the Supreme Audit Court functioned under the supervision of the Ministry of Finance. 

After the Islamic Revolution of Iran in 1979, according to article 54 and 54 of the constitution, the Supreme Audit Court was assigned to operate under the direct supervision of the Parliament.

The SAC was thereby appointed to act as a legal inspector and auditor of the country and finally in 1982, the new audit act was ratified by the Parliament. This act bestowed extensive auditing powers to the organization.

Mandate

According to the articles 1 to 7 of the Supreme Audit Court Act, this organization has the following responsibilities and powers:

Article 1  The objective of the Supreme Audit Court as stated in the articles of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran is the exertion of continuous financial control and supervision in order to safeguard the Bait-ul-mal (Public Treasury) through the following ways:

1. To control financial operations and activities of all Ministries, institutions, government companies and other organizations which in any manner whatsoever benefit from the state budget.
2. To examine and audit funds spent and the revenues and other resources of obtaining revenues in relations to the financial policies stipulated in the approved budget with consideration of the operations and auditing report received from the related auditees.
3. Preparation and drawing up of the budget liquidation report together with its own comments and its presentation to the Majlis (Parliament).

Article 2   Examining or auditing all the revenue and expenditure accounts and other receipts and payments, as well as financial statements of organizations from the viewpoint that they comply with financial rules and regulations and other relative laws and indispensable criteria.

Note- According to this Act, the organization shall include all the Ministries, organizations, institutions, government companies, and other organizations, which in any possible way benefit from the State Budget and in general any executive organization on which, according to articles 44 and 45 of the Constitution public ownership is applied to.

Organizations that public regulations are applied to must also be audited according to this article.

Article 3   Examining the occurrence of financial operations in government or organization to ensure that expected revenues have been obtained and these revenues have been deposited in the related accounts timely and properly and to ensure that expenditures and other receipts and payments are correct.

Article 4   Examining the accounts of properties and assets of the organizations.

Article 5   Examining and ensuring that appropriate financial methods and directions have been established and that these methods and directions are applied effectively in order to achieve the auditees' objectives.

Article 6   Commenting on the necessity of the existence of the internal controlling organization or the insufficiency of the existing organization in the aditees. This opinion is expressed according to audit reports and examinations done in order to safeguard the Bait-ul-mal.

Article 7   Examining the deficit accounts of assets and financial violations and any kind of discrepancies in account that the related government officers have committed in implementing the rules and regulations by the manner determined by this law.

Organizational structure

The president of SAC who holds the highest official position existing in the organization and who is elected by Parliament, heads the Supreme Audit Court of Iran.

Controlled by the President, the SAC consists of the following four main Directorates.

1. Directorate for technical and auditing affairs of Ministries, government institutions and foundations.
2. Directorate for technical and auditing affairs of companies
3. Directorate for legal, parliamentary affairs and Budget liquidation 
4. Directorate for planning and executive affairs

Each one of these directorates, lead and coordinate the activities of the different offices of the general directors, and present the classified outcome of their performance result for an overall review. 

Public Prosecutors office and the Judiciary Board

The duties of the public prosecutor's office are as follows:

1. To ensure the right use of Public Treasury in the legal framework.
2. To draw up petition against the related officials to be examined to be examined in the Judiciary Boards of the SAC or to be referred to the judiciary according to note one of article 21 of the Supreme Audit Court Act.

There is a great similarly between the functions of the Public prosecutor's office and the Judiciary. The Assistant public prosecutors having considered the reports of the auditors and offended parties, and having verified the violation of the Law, shall issue a written and through the president of the SAC refer the case to one of the Judiciary boards.

The Judiciary Boards are in fact the courts of the SAC. They attend the legal cases referred to them and pass judgement thereupon.

The Judiciary board having passed judgement, for or against the auditee, notifies the public prosecutor, who shall in turn execute the verdict.

Personnel

Approximately 1226 people work in the Supreme Audit Court of Iran, 815 number of which are commissioned to work in the 28 Provincial Branches and the remaining 411 work in the Central office of the Supreme Audit Court (SAC head quarters) in Tehran. The total 1226 employees include the auditors (permanently situated at the auditee main office), experts and technicians who provide high quality service in the different quarters.

International Affairs

On 4/9/1998 the new organizational structure of the Supreme Audit Court was expanded and approved by the Parliament. In this regard, the office of Public Relations and International Affairs was established in order to improve international relations and cooperation.

In recent years, the Iranian SAI has tried to establish friendly and cooperative relationship with other countries. It has, as a result, used the experience of the other SAIs to develop government auditing. It has upgraded its activities in international cooperation by exchange of high-ranking delegations, participation in international seminars and congresses, and participation in international training courses. The Iranian SAI has also developed close cooperation with regional and international audit organizations such as INTOSAI, ASOSAI, and ECOSAI.

Training

The centre for training and improvement of human resources follows the following performance strategy.

Plan and programming activities:

• Study and review of modular and on job training plans for employees, based on the third five year state development plan and the future needs of the occupied jobs of the SAC.
• Provision of training standards of jobs.
• Promoting the activities of "The planning and designing of training activities section".
• The planning and designing of training activities section intends to plan, design and provide the training needs, and practical as well as theoretical, themes and sub-themes/sections for study.
• Helping define and communicate the national surveys carried out in the field of audit and audit concepts.
• Keeping up the monthly publication of "Hassib" magazine in order to introduce the new audit concepts to employees.
• Continuing the seasonal publication of "Audit knowledge" magazine, nation wide, in order to promote the general audit knowledge of all of the public organizations.
• Carrying out a statistical study on the productivity of employees, in order to provide a basic foundation for the future policymaking.

Executive activities

The office for training and improvement of human resources has conducted many series of general swand technical training courses with the intention of furthering these courses to the international sphere.

Performance Auditing in the SAC

In recent years, the Supreme Audit of Iran has considered Performance Audit as an unavoidable criterion in order to:

• execute the third economic, social and cultural development plan
• help the executive authorities in the better use of the financial resources available and 
• assure accountability

Therefore many infrastructure projects have been audited in view of:

• Economy, in purchasing the basic materials
• Efficiency, in the use of the resources and
• Effectiveness, as in the accomplishment of the objectives.

In the meantime many great efforts are also been made to promote and improve the performance audit knowledge of the existing human resources.

These long term plans have started and will continue to the years 2002 and 2003 in the form of training courses and workshops on VFM for auditors, senior auditors and directors.