Accountants in here please!

BenjiSayers

BenjiSayers

BenjiSayers

Soldato
Joined
13 Dec 2006
Posts
3,326
Hi,

I am currently in the middle of looking at my future and need to really start developing a proper career. I currently work in the IT industry doing technical support for a Business orientated ISP and while I have learnt a lot all it has really done is destroy any interest I might of had left in computers etc.

Anyway! I have been looking around at jobs and have noticed that there seems to always been a need for some sort of accountant. What I would like to know is can anyone recommend where I should start in regards to a course(s) to build up my experience.

I am aware it wont be an overnight thing but I need to start from somewhere so would like to make sure I pick the right path and don't discover that down the road that my time and money has been wasted doing the wrong courses.

I know my mum has been doing her CIMA? so I assume I would want to start with the foundation of this but am not quite sure what this would be called.

Cheers,

Ben
 
Go to the respective association bodies such as ICAEW and ACCA and have a look on there. If you want to do chartered you need a training contract with a firm as part of it has to be professional experience. Certified might be slightly different though. CIMA is management accountancy which again is slightly different so check out the organisation's website :)
 
Cheers for the quick reply! It is all these various bodies that confuse me.

I shall have a look at some sites and then see what is available near me course-wise as I work during the day.
 
AAT = Association of Accounting Technicians
ACCA = Association of Certified Chartered Accountants
ICAEW = Institute of Chartered Accountants for England & Wales
CIMA = Chartered Institute of Management Accountants

They all have websites - check them out.

I would very strongly suggest getting some work experience in either an accounts department or a firm of accountants. It's going to be a long, hard slog to become a qualified accountant and you'd better be sure you want to embark on such a journey. Good also to talk to accounts clerks, Financial Controllers, Finance Directors/CFOs and find out what qualifications they have & how they got where they are.

I've just spent 3 years (part time) doing the first 2 parts of ACCA and have taken a year off as we've just had a baby. I study along side working in a finance dept for a multinational I'm now looking to convert my ACCA part-qual and qualify through CIMA as it better suits my career aspirations.

"Some sort of accountant" is a pretty broad church. What is it you want to do?
 
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Hi,

Thanks for the information :)

I understand it is a pretty broad outline at the minute as I am trying to get as much information possible so that I can try and make the right choice for me. I'm fully aware that a lot of hard work will be involved but I believe that if I decided to go down this route then it will pay-off when I am older.

I am only 22 so am still quite young and have a lot of time I will need to be prepared to dedicate to doing this so the more information I have at my disposal the better :)
 
ACCA is a complete pain with 14 exams all at 3 hours each :( I have taken 7 so far which is halfway through it and touch wood ive passed everyone 1st time :)
 
My ultimate aim is a Finance Director or Chief Financial Officer, probably in the field I am currently. Shorter term, CIMA qualified Management Accountant.

Do you have a standing interest in accounts or is it the high potential earning that are attractive?
 
I don't have a standing interest in accounts per se at the minute, but from seeing what my mum does (she is a Finance Controller I believe) at the minute think it is something I could definitely get my teeth in to and do.

I was considered to work in the accounts department where I work at the minute but chose to decline it as there was a lot on internal squabbling within the department that made it not the nicest of places to be. :)
 
I'd recommend CIMA as it is more interesting (;) just to wind up the ACCA members in here). I did a uni degree, which exempts me from the foundation stage of the CIMA qualification and a couple of exams in the middle section. You can start from the bottom easily enough and work your way up whilst working. Look on the CIMA website for full details.
I currently work for Nestle and hope to become fully qualified in the next couple of years (work are paying for me to study, but only give me a couple of days off per exam).
And, obviously, the long term goal is world dom.... I mean to earn lots and lots of money.
Accountants will always be needed as long as there are companies!
Of course there are several other monetary jobs that you can go into once qualified, you don't have to become an accountant
 
ACCA is the way to go ;)

I started ACCA about 2 years ago after getting my degree. I got 5 exemptions from the ACCA so had 9 exams to take and have so far passed 7 and failed 1 in that time, so only 2 to go. That's assuming I passed the 2 I took in December (results on 18th Feb!).

It's difficult and requires a lot of work. Studying and working at the same time takes a bit of a hit on your social life, especially as you get closer to exam time (exams in June and December). You also need 3 years working experience to qualify and have passed the competences from the training record.

Find a job where they'll pay for your training and give you time off for study etc.

Whether you choose CIMA or ACCA etc will depend on the job you eventually want to do. If you'd like to work in an accountants firm then ACCA is better imo. You could choose ACA (ICAEW) but tbh it's very similar to ACCA and more people do ACCA than ACA now.
 
My aims are Big4 ACA qualified and working in tax. If I don't get Big4 will either go for Grant Thornton, BDO or a small firm doing general practice. Once qualified I'll have another think about whether I want to continue in that area or use my skills somewhere else.
 
Mad old tory said:
My aims are Big4 ACA qualified and working in tax. If I don't get Big4 will either go for Grant Thornton, BDO or a small firm doing general practice. Once qualified I'll have another think about whether I want to continue in that area or use my skills somewhere else.
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Good luck! I'm currently in my first year at KPMG in FS Tax doing just that - ICAS & CTA. Going to be bloody hard work to get all these exams done!
 
Thanks for all the replies so far :)

I have been speaking to my mum and I think we have decided it will be best if I start of looking at doing the AAT, and once I have my teeth in to that considering doing the CIMA.

Any opinions/advice you guys/gals can offer in regards to that?
 
Doing AAT first is a good idea if you have no previous finance/accounting experience or qualifications. I think AAT gets you 3 exam exemptions from ACCA but you should be able to check the exemptions on the ACCA/ICAEW/CIMA websites.

If CIMA is your choice then that's fine, there's no problem with it.
 
Guv said:
You could choose ACA (ICAEW) but tbh it's very similar to ACCA and more people do ACCA than ACA now.
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More people do ACCA because it's easier to get a training contract and a lot easier to pass. ACA is still considered to be the best qualification, so if you want the best that's the way to go (either ICAEW or ICAS). Can you guess which qualification I'm studying for?
 
SaBBz said:
More people do ACCA because it's easier to get a training contract and a lot easier to pass. ACA is still considered to be the best qualification, so if you want the best that's the way to go (either ICAEW or ICAS). Can you guess which qualification I'm studying for?
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I'm sorry but that's a load of rubbish.
The qualifications are very similar in terms of how difficult they are. I agree the ACA final case study is a very hard exam but I've also been told the final ACCA corporate reporting paper is harder than the ACA equivilent.

So what makes you think ACA is the best? 10+ years ago maybe it was but I'm not so sure anymore
 
Guv said:
I'm sorry but that's a load of rubbish.
The qualifications are very similar in terms of how difficult they are. I agree the ACA final case study is a very hard exam but I've also been told the final ACCA corporate reporting paper is harder than the ACA equivilent.

So what makes you think ACA is the best? 10+ years ago maybe it was but I'm not so sure anymore
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Of course you're going to say that. You only have to look at the salaries offered to ACA qualified accountants over certified accountants to see what the industry thinks. Also just look at the requirements for doing the ACA and ACCA at the same firm and I think you'll find you need to be a fair bit better academically to be accepted onto the ACA.
 
I'm in my Technician year of the AAT now and kinda wish i'd gone straight onto Cima/ACCA as its pretty easy since i did A level accounting.

Working at Begbies Traynow at the miniute which is an insolvency company so pretty interesting.

To start off your probably gonna be looking at either an apprentaship type course which is fairly low wage or a puchase ledger/credit control type person in a larger business
 
BenjiSayers said:
I have been speaking to my mum and I think we have decided it will be best if I start of looking at doing the AAT, and once I have my teeth in to that considering doing the CIMA.
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I don't really see the point really if you know you want to do CIMA. My girlfriend has just completed CIMA and it took her 3 years, 1 year of certificate level exams and then 1 each for the managerial and strategy level.

She also has a friend currently doing AAT which is going to take her about 2/3 years, and then she has to go on to do CIMA on top of that so it could end up taking double the amount of time. I see no point in doing AAT if you know at the start what you want to do.

Most people that seem to do AAT are;

1) People that never meant to get into accounting, did it for an accounts clerk job and then at some point after decided what they wanted to do the proffesional exams to further themselves (like my sister who is now doing ACA)

2) People who intend to stay as an assistant for ever.

Obviously that is a very broad generalisation but that is my experience of it, from both my sister and 3 friends from school who ended up doing AAT. Of the people that I know that have wanted to be accountants from the start they have missed AAT and gone straight into the CIMA/ACA/ACCA course and done it in half the time.

*Edit* As proved by the above person!!
 
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