Hi,

welcome to the forum and well done on the research so far which as you have already identified, whilst there is no reason that the information gained doing ICB would not be useful in an employment situation employers as a general rule are not interested which whilst that may be a bit unfair on the qualification its their money so they get to set the rules.

Note that in some ways this is more based on history than the qualification in that the managers hiring people will have studied AAT themselves before moving on to higher qualifications so they know the quality of the qualification and look to hire through the same channel.

What employers are actually looking for is fully qualified AAT or PQ (which refers to part qualified generally with ACCA or CIMA).

The reasoning behind this is that in both practice and industry bookkeeping is looked at as the foundation level of accountancy. You may be employed as a bookkeeper but you will be expected to understand at least the basics of accountancy... We're not talking dark side stuff, just being able to properly understand the components of the primary financial statements.

The reasoning behind that is that a bookkeeper entering the data needs to understand where that data will end up. For example, a receipt in advance is a liability not a sale (as such). The last thing that an employer wants is a bookkeeper being able to enter the data into the system but not understanding the reality of the transactions that they are entering (#1).

It has been said before on here that a fundamental difference between bookkeeping and accountancy is the difference between knowing how to do something and why you are doing it.

AAT is very much a crossover qualification where you are taught both how to process the data but also introduced to why you are doing it.

Ok, onto which qualification.

The AAT bookkeeping qualification is excellent but it should not be considered that any more than an introductory qualification that will give you some excellent skills and gain some exemptions from the full AAT qualification.

It is not what employers are talking about when they are looking for AAT.

Employers expect candidates for roles to have taken all of the papers of the full AAT qualification through to MAAT status or have passed at least (for example) the first three ACCA papers (but preferably the first nine).

Unfortunately in a situation where we have more people with the qualifications than jobs available they also require proven experience creating the eternl catch 22 that you cannot get the job without the experience and you cannot get the experience without first getting having held down a relevant role for a couple of years.

And there lies the appeal of self employment and the ICB / IAB niche market.

However, as you will read on here that market in some areas (mine for one) is flooded by training companies churning out more new bookkeepers than the market can possibly hope to accomodate.

Sorry about the reality check in this reply but don't want you wandering into the qualifications minefield and investing thousands of pounds only to end up with a lot more knowledge and a lot less money.

Now onto the job itself.

When working for yourself you very much live the job.

The idea of nine to five, five days a week is straight out of the window as the hours that others work are often spent selling to them and the hours when they are not working is when you are.

You will never, ever stop learning as once you definitely, absolutely know something then they will come along and change it. Also there are things that you will not use all of the time so you need to invest in CPD (continued Professional Development) to stay ahead of the game.

So, if this is still a career that interests you your next step should be to take a serious look at the full AAT qualification.

Amongst others Nick from Premier Training or Sonya from Eagle Education are both excellent starting points in the search for the course provider that is right for you.

Also try Ideal Schools and Woodgrove Tutorials (I don't think that Training Link do AAT).

Good luck moving forwards and I look forwards to chatting as you progress through your training,

kind regards,

Shaun.

#1 My feeling is that as time goes on market forces will move ICB more towards accountancy as bookkeeping in isolation of accounts work is a dieing profession. I forsee that eventually there will be no major difference between MAAT and MICB except in the minds of employers which are more prone to evolving slowly to new options rather than simply accepting such.
Changes made today by the ICB would in reality not be felt in the industry for ten years or more as whilst the environment may at times be fast paced the underlieing industry remains very conservative (not refering to the political party there).

Hey dear, if you want to do AAT training then ---------------- (#1) offers you best training in AAT. It has highly qualified and professional trainers which you provide practical knowledge.

 

 

#1 Institution reference removed by moderator for incorrectly stating that such was the best without appropriate corroborative evidence

-- Edited by Shamus on Saturday 24th of August 2013 01:05:08 PM