I used Osbourne books and found them quite good.
When you become a student member you get a login for the website which has loads of revision material which includes timed tests in the same format as the actual exams which helped me a lot!
I'm not AAT but I tend to buy the books from all publisheres for all major examining bodies (AAT, ACCA, CIMA and ACA... There's even an ICB book thrown in there and a full set of books for an HND in accounting).
I've got AAT books from Osbourne, BPP and Kaplan. All are very good (At higher AAT levels the BPP and Kaplan ones just being the ACCA study texts with quite a lot taken out).
Osbourne win as they have David Cox as one of their writers and he is very, very good. Able to convey complex ideas in simple terms.
That said, I find that for level II the revision book for units 1-4 (all in one book) from BPP is excellent and its a sound pre exam text not just for AAT level II but for eiother of the bookkeeping qualifications.
Often you will find subjects in one text that are not explained in a manner that gells with you where with other books it probably would have done. This especially happens where you read a question phrased one way and your study text takes things from a different angle.
A good sollution is to buy all of the books... OMG he says, I'm trying to do this on a budget!
Well, the key is to go through Amazon resllers and pick the books up for next to nothing. A good few of mine cost 1p plus £2.80 delivery. Others from Amazon warehouse come in at undeer £2 delivery included.
Don't buy second hand tax books and try to keep all of your main texts current and from the same publisher. But, there is no reason not to give old study texts a new home, especially the bookkeeping levels as bookkeeping and management accounting basically never change.
Fiancial accounting is going through change where International standards are in a state of flux and UKGAAP is being replaced by IFRS (they just don't call it IFRS, they call it FRS102).
Any financial accounting study text pre 2009 is pretty much useless to you as there will be too much in there that may have changed.
After 2009 the main changes have related to financial instruments which you don't need to worry about too much for AAT.
Don't know if it helps but I know of at least one person who did AAT by studying ACCA and they got very good marks. The benefit there is that you would listen to the free lectures on Opentuition where Mike Little really brings the subject matter to life... Usually with a few personal anacdotes and some excellent interaction with his Eastern European classes.
Oops, went off into waffle mode. Basically, yes, I concur totally that the driving books for your studies should be osbourne. (although the others are also very, very good).
When studying try to learn the subject, not just how to pass exams which is a mindset that many fall into even when starting out with the best intentions.
Good luck in your studies and good choice of qualification,
kind regards,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
To be honest at Premier Training we use Osborne Books and students do like them. However, BPP are keen for us to buy their books and left is an inspection set of their books and Neil (Spam Kebab) and I are quite taken with them and oftern get the out to get another persepctive on something.
All the best
Nick
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Nick
Nick Craggs FMAAT ACA AAT Distance Learning Manager
