Several studies have shown that the level of zakāh compliance varies by different age groups. When age and income increased, the awareness to pay zakāh also increased. However, compliance behaviour among youth to pay zakāh is low, and there is no assurance that level will increase as age increases. If the level of compliance does not improve, then potential to improve zakāh collection in the future is minimal. Therefore, it is very crucial to study the level of compliance behaviour on zakāh among youth and to identify factors influencing their obligation towards paying zakāh. This study was conducted to identify factors influencing zakāh compliance behaviour among youth in Klang

Internal audit function (IAF) is one of the most important meanings for management to confirm and verify the compliance of administrative units in the financial and administrative policies, legislations, financials and administrative systems as well as the adoption of public policies. IAF also helps in running an organization more efficiently and effectively to increase stakeholders’ value. Moreover, with growing size and attention given to the zakat institutions in the recent years, it has made an increase importance of IAF. Due to the importance of IAF, this paper aims to identify the perceived effectiveness of internal audit department (IAD) in zakat institutions (ZI) from auditees’ perspective to assist on close cooperation and necessary improvement in the IAF. To develop the understanding of the factors that lead to effectiveness of IAD, this paper used qualitative method which is semi-structured interview auditees from four selected ZIs in Malaysia. Each ZIs was represented by two auditees from two different department. There are two factors explored, namely organizational status and competency of IAD. The findings show that both factors are important to achieve the effectiveness of IAF. Additionally, most of the auditees (ZI1, ZI2 and ZI3) agreed that management support are the main factors affecting the IAD effectiveness. Meanwhile, ZI4 perceived that training is the main factor contributing to the same effectiveness. It is hoped that the findings are able to increase the awareness among ZI’s auditors and management to improve the IAD effectiveness in the future.  

Zakat institutions play an important role in Malaysian socioeconomics. The ability of zakat institutions to collect zakat has been undoubtedly proven by the increasing collection amounting to millions recorded every year. However, Zakat institutions are still largely being critiqued by society over its transparency and efficacy in zakat distributions. Thus, it seems very crucial for zakat institutions to maintain a gold standard of governance and good practice in order to overcome the issue of deteriorating public trust. One of the important components involved in achieving good governance of service, is through the provision of effective internal auditing. By taking into account four constructs for measuring the internal audit function which are organizational status, scope of work, top management support and competency, this research attempts to investigate the relationship between internal auditing and zakat performance. A quantitative method is used for this research. A set of questionnaires were developed and sent to the internal auditors (operation/quality auditors) of all zakat institutions in Malaysia. 94 questionnaires were returned from a total of eight zakat institutions. Results from the multiple regression analysis carried out concludes that organizational status and competency are a significant predictor for zakat performance. Organizational status seemed to be the strongest unique contributor towards zakat performance, followed by competency of internal auditors.