I recently graduated with a 2.1. in business and computing and have decided to pursue a career in accounting. I have applied for countless trainee accounting positions to no avail, so have decided that I will study at home towards the AAT qualification. How long can I expect to complete this in, and how would exams work if I was doing distance learning? I work part time at the moment so have the whole day free more or less to study; would 1 year be a reasonable timescale to obtain this qualification, and to what extent do you think it will help me get a job as a trainee accountant, and eventually move on to obtain funding for the ACCA qualification?
Considering that you already come to the table with a business degree, with total dedication you could I believe do AAT in a year (although personally I would set your goal at 18 months).
Give Nick or Neil at First Intuition a call. They are very helpful and approachable. Also Nick is a chartered accountant so any advice that he gives could prove invaluable to you.
On the job front the question has to be how have you been approaching your job search?
If you have only been applying for advertised roles then you won't get to interview as hundreds of more experienced people will have been applying for the same roles. You to be applying for the roles that have not been advertised.
Go through all of the local practices, investigate them, write a CV and covering letter that appeals to that specific firm (emphasise the relevance of your business degree, do you have any business experience? Did you set up a business as part of your degree program?), follow up applications a week later with a polite phone call.
Do not chase money, don't even mention money in the applications.
Worth mentioning here, be prepared to work very long days with no overtime payments and low wages. The ACCA qualification when you get to that stage will take 5+ years.
Have you thought of doing the free ACCA-X course as an introduction (rather than AAT level II), then AAT levels III and IV? (level IV is a serious step up in complexity).
Kindest 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.
Does the plan include becoming your own boss at any point? As I understand it, with ACCA, it's not simples! I worked in practice with just my AAT, as I had no desire to go near audit! When I left work, with good experience, getting my licence was relatively simple due to that experience. Just a thought :)
there are three different levels of practice certificate with the ACCA. The standard one, the Audit one and the Insolvency practitioner one.
I did the advanced audit options papers and to be honest the main thing that it taught me was that fun as Audit is (and I mean that!) don't go anywhere near it as its the most litigous, cut throat area of accountancy best left to mid tier and up firms.
You will find relatively few smaller ACCA practices offer auditing services (but they will know a practice that does).
The issue that you hint at is something called regulation 8 which effectively prevents members from setting up in practice doing anything other than bookkeeping (nothing beyond trial balance). I must admit that I answered this one on the basis that the question was geared totally towards employment which is not a bad thing as the poster gets AAT, moves up to ACCA, gets their experience and then the practice certificate is not a problem if at some stage they decide to go out on their own.
Lol, he only asked about which qualification and we're devising a ten year plan here.
I digress, what I was going for was that ACCA and Audit work are not synonomous. Its more about the brand and the knowledge base that its members must have achieved in order to be one of the (relative) few who get through to membership. (There are a lot of drop outs especially when things move up from BSc level study to MSc at paper P2 (actually at P1 but that one's more of a transition paper)).
For those just starting out I cannot recomend ACCA highly enough. It may not be the qualification that one eventually trades under (you have to leave the ACCA to trade under a different flag) but the knowledge base that you acquire along the way is second to none (and that includes Chartered... We don't get to take the books into exams with us, lol).
If you can pass ACCA then the bodies that people use as flags of convenience (AAT, AIA, IFA, ICPA, etc) will accept you as a full members. And if you can prove experience, with a practice certificate.
Yes, going ACCA may be using a sledgehammer to crack a nut in some instances... But is it not better to aim for the stars?
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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.
When I started out, audit thresholds were much, much lower, and firms expected you to take the audit route. I was just musing over my past.
My understanding of ACCA comes from comments made on BKN in the past - for example, in December 2011, you said...
Going the ACCA route is never a mistake from the level of knowledge gained perspective but as you've spotted from my prevvious posts trying to earn a crust whilst staying within the remit of regulation 8 can be an absolute nightmare.
Then of course you hit the real catch 22. You can't get a job without experience and you can't gain experience because you can't get a job.
Regulation 8 effectively prevents gaining real experience in a self employed capacity as all that you can offer are bookkeeping to trial balance, VAT and Payroll work and I defy anyone to be able to make a living out of that (no accounts work, no advice).
Also, as touched upon above, being an ACCA student even restricts who you are allowed to work for in a related capacity.
And you also mentioned
Before signing up for ACCA though remember the restrictions that it's going to place on you.... That would be the cunningly hidden machine gun nest at the end of the trap door and mine strewn corridor!
And in April 2013
On the practicalities of membership
To become a member you need to gain two years signed off in a relevant role under a suitably qualified accountant (not necessarily ACCA).
You will have to complete an experience return showing that you have gained practical experience in certain areas, some of which can be quite difficult to attain in small practices.
There is a difference between membership and being able to practice.
To become a member you need two years signed off either before or after you qualify.
To be able to practice you need three years signed off two of which must be post qualification.
Everything I have ever read on here (which is the only place my understanding comes from, to be honest) says "ACCA is a great qualification with a lot of clout, but a nightmare to get a practice license". Perhaps I have been given the wrong impression, or these comments are geared to people ho dont intend to be employed... but with this being in my mind, I thought it was appropriate to bring up Directive 8, just so David can review it, and can give it some thought, if he ever wishes to be self employed. And I wanted to let him know that AAT could be enough, whether employed or self employed, should funding not materialise, or indeed should he not be able to gain employment in the correct firm, giving the struggle he is having at the moment... which may continue after AAT is achieved.. hopefully not though, David!
PS - if you are wondering how on earth I remembered these posts, its because when I joined BKN, I was considering doing ACCA, and this put me off, and lead me to consider adding ATT to my bow
Boy, that little lot must have taken some hunting down! Have I lit a blue touch paper Michelle?... This thread or yesterdays?
For future reference use the word Draconian when you are searching for my old posts related to regulation 8 You'll find a load of them much faster.
The message though as you will note is never anti ACCA but rather we have an unfair system where other qualifications do not have the same sort of quality control so ACCA people in many ways may suffer from doing the right qualification.
A not perfect sollution is to learn one's trade under the ACCA and then step down and practce under someone elses flag but of course that causes the issue that if you have sweated blood to earn a top qualification it does not feel right to abandon that for a different one.
You are of course using advice based on self employment questions in relation to a question here that is based on someone attempting to find first employment in the field.
On the audit front things have changed somewhat in that you need to be a very strong firm indeed to qualify an audit report which places practitioners in the uneasy situation of either being sued for qualification or losing their right to practice for not qualifying a set of accounts.
The way things are now insurance companies settle on frivelous grounds for fear of the settlements being dished out in court and the associated irrecoverable cost of defending in court. Even the mid range firms now need to join together to offer audit so it is very brave small firms that offer statutory audits (although its quite common for firms to offer audit services not resulting in a statutory audit).
If I had to put my finger on the moment that things changed I would say 1987 with the Caparo Industries case although maybe more significant was the 1989 ADT case that effectively killed Binder Hamlyn (they were in fact subsequently consumed the Andersens). I cannot see either of those being before your time but I suspect that the true effects of them did take quite some time to ripple through to firms that had until then been offering Stat Audit's.
p.s. Whilst referencing old posts or taking quotes from them is fair game (even those that are four years old!) I find the approach taken here to be a little below you Michelle. I am sure that it is not your intent to be confrontational but thats how it has come across to me.
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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.
PS - if you are wondering how on earth I remembered these posts, its because when I joined BKN, I was considering doing ACCA, and this put me off, and lead me to consider adding ATT to my bow
Missed this one whilst I was replying to the others.
For what you wanted (immediate self employment) ACCA would not have been right for you unless you were able to work with a practice recognised for practice supervision purposes so its probably quite lucky that you read my earlier posts.
ATT is a sound tax qualification and well worth adding to AAT.
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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.
My post was simply to put my earlier comment into context, and to help David. Your previous posts allowed me to quickly explain where my understanding had come from, whether it was correct or not, and also give David some information, without my having to type it all out. It also gives you the opportunity to explain things a little more for David, such as why its not relevant, in this case. Sorry that you feel it was confrontational towards you, but its not about you, hun.. its about David ;)
A simple search for ACCA Directive 8 was all that was needed :)
It's just occurred. You do realise that ACCA and ACCA-X are not the same thing don't you? (different qualifications, same professional body)
Everything that I wrote up until the last bit was about him doing AAT.
He had suggested ACCA and I told him what that would take.
I then went on to suggest ACCA-X as the first step.
The next post was about you thinking that all ACCA people offer audit services which I was correcting.
... Lol. This feels like two aid workers fighting over who gives the food to the person without any!
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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.
"do you think it will help me get a job as a trainee accountant, and eventually move on to obtain funding for the ACCA qualification?"
I just wanted to bring directive 8 to the table, so David could look into it, and decide if it would affect him, help with the companies he applies to, or at least, he could have it in the back of his mind as he progresses. I was not thinking ACCA was all about audit, I clarified that it was just why I never took ACCA... because at that time, I was expected to take the audit route, due to lower threshold and smaller firms having more audit work - and I didn't want to go there.
I'm not fighting with you, Shaun, I am trying to help David. And you insinuated I was having a pop at you. Which was wrong.
I think that any casual reader will take the above as having a pop whether such was intended or not.
You quoted several of my own posts back at me.
Not just saying that I had mentioned regulation 8 in the past (which I am always ready to warn people about when such is applicable... As you have kindly evidenced above) but actually cutting and pasting several old posts to make a point.
If someone had done that to you I would have interjected and told them to be more respectful.
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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.
What is wrong with quoting your posts? I was trying to explain where I was coming from, a) so you could provide further advice to David, and b) to show David what the issues could be . It wasn't disrespectful, it was informative. If you are so negative that you take it to be that way, even though I since explained why, I think perhaps you have spent too much time on Aweb. And not wanting BKN to become the likes of Aweb, I'm not going to say any more on the matter.
David, I wish you luck, and hope that, whilst Shaun has taken my efforts in a completely different direction, they will have been some use to you.
