Six U.S. companies--H.J. Heinz, Supervalu, Electronic Arts, Legg Mason, J.M. Smucker Co., and BMC Software--have reached settlements with investors to provide more information on auditor independence, according to the United Brotherhood of Carpenters, which is leading a shareholder campaign on this issue.

The six issuers have agreed to provide an audit firm independence statement that details the company's audit firm, the firm's tenure, and states that the audit committee "periodically considers whether there should be a regular rotation of the independent external audit firm," according to the Carpenters.

"The points of disclosure in the settlement are a solid step in providing shareholder information about the tenure of the relationship and the audit committee's role in various processes (fee negotiations, audit partner rotation, [and] periodic consideration of firm rotation), and it also includes a statement that the committee believes the continued retention of the audit firm is in the best interests of the company and its investors," Ed Durkin, director of corporate governance at the Carpenters union, told ISS. 

So far this year, the Carpenters have filed 16 proposals that seek annual audit firm independence reports. Dell, McKesson Corp., Xilinx, and Computer Sciences Corp. have submitted no-action petitions to exclude these resolutions, but the Securities and Exchange Commission has not yet ruled on those requests. Earlier, the Carpenters filed dozens of resolutions that called for seven-year auditor rotation policies, but the SEC staff allowed companies to omit those proposals on "ordinary business" grounds.