Can anyone relate to this

[zee]

Hey there can anyone relate to this:

I am a trainee accountant who had started acca after completing my degree. I found that like other professional qualifications most of the knowledge provided in the course was just extra information and not what we’d experience in real life and was there just to make qualification harder so that higher salaries could be maintained for those that would qualify. Most of the course was boring and only about 20% of it i found to be relevant. I had a look through the aat syllabus and found that although less prestigious aat was a summarised precise and practical based version of the acca and covered nothing extra or less to study. At the same time doing aat would get you exemptions from your acca and you would be able to continue the latter from the level you finished the former. As i had a degree to give me a decent base and as I was looking for a bit of a shortcut i started the aat. And after completing some aat modules i then found that my double entry (core accounting skills ) was stronger than many high up in acca colleagues at work and college. I too found that most employers were more interested in how skilled their applicants were in comparision to which course or exams they were doing. So i think i made a good choice, in being able to gain knowledge of core and some senior accounting principles ahead of time with the aat. If i need to resume or complete the acca i could also always do that.

 

[zee]

Apologies for the mistake in line 6 above and on which this site has not allowed me to make an edit. I had meant to say that the aat never involved studying anything extra or less than whats neccasery for practical purposes.

 

[Fidget]

Sounds to me as if you've come out of your degree thinking that taking on ACCA would be a breeze, then realised that you've bitten off more than you can chew.

Exams from any of the professional accountancy bodies aren't designed to be "harder". They're designed to test your competency in accountancy. These are the bodies that are going to lend their name for you to use as a fully fledged Accountant. Why shouldn't they expect that you're aware of more on the subject than you've read in your text book?

AAT, whilst a qualification in its own right, isn't a professional accountancy qualification and won't score you many exemptions if you do go on to do any of the professional qualifications.