That's how the nation's largest accounting firm is pitching its new way of doing business.

It promises in full-page newspaper ads to "ask the tough questions and tackle the tough issues." And if its auditors see any hint of questionable accounting at their corporate clients, they will resign.

That's some tough talk coming from a firm that has been under fire for its role in a number of accounting scandals, including at Tyco International.

The question is whether it can live up to it. One thing is for sure: It can't afford not to.

PricewaterhouseCoopers, or any of the big public accounting firms, can't risk another stumble, not after all the controversy during the past year.

The industry's troubles began with the demise of Arthur Andersen, once the largest U.S. accounting firm. It collapsed last year after it was convicted of obstruction of justice for shredding documents in the Enron case.

And that wasn't its only problem. Andersen also agreed to pay millions of dollars to settle lawsuits alleging that it allowed accounting fraud to go on at other companies it audited.

While Andersen has stolen most of the spotlight, other firms remain vulnerable.

"Andersen was here one day and gone the next," said Moses Pava, a professor of accounting and business ethics at the Sy Syms School of Business at Yeshiva University. "It is a real possibility that others can easily do the same."

All the big firms have been touched by scandal during the past year.

PricewaterhouseCoopers has come under attack for its auditors' approval of the aggressive accounting employed at Tyco, whose executives have since been charged with stealing millions from the company.

The firm, through its advertising campaign, now says it will take a tougher stance with its corporate clients on accounting issues and it expects clients to be more forthcoming with information. It is demanding "straight talk" among auditors and those who oversee the audits at the companies.

It will deploy better procedures to detect fraud, and it also plans to come up with ways to convey to the public how conservative or aggressive companies are with their accounting procedures.

And it will work hard to close the "expectations gap" between what investors expect from audits and what audits are intended to do.

While investors want public accountants to sniff out every bit of wrongdoing, the purpose of an audit is to determine whether the financial statements are in accord with generally accepted accounting principles. That doesn't mean combing through every bit of data.

"When investors see PricewaterhouseCoopers and other firms' signatures, they assume that 100 percent of the financial statements are true and accurate, even if that might not be the case under current professional standards," said Dennis Nally, U.S. chairman and senior partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers. "We have to do a better job telling the public what our job entails, what we are responsible for."

These bold promises, which are being advertised in some of the nation's largest newspapers, will hold PricewaterhouseCoopers somewhat accountable, at least in terms of its reputation.

And if it falters, it may not be the only one that suffers.

A study, which appeared in the September issue of the Journal of Accounting Research, showed how Andersen's woes with Enron also affected its other corporate clients and their investors.

For instance, when Andersen admitted shredding Enron documents, it had a negative effect on the stock values of 284 other Andersen clients that are part of the Standard & Poor's 1500 index, the study said.

Two-thirds of those stocks fell on the day of the announcement and the rest came in the next three days as investors questioned the validity of their financial statements. During that time, the stocks dropped on average 2.05 percent and lost more than $37-million in market value, the study said.

"This demonstrates that audits matter and investors will consider the quality of the audit when they look at the value of the company," said the study's co-author, Paul Chaney, an associate professor of accounting at the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University.

PricewaterhouseCoopers is taking a big step with its declaration. And by being so public with the promises, it puts itself under pressure to live up to them.