Advice Re: Book-keeping

cjoffy

Hi, I am considering taking a course in book-keeping. I recently graduated from University where i gained a degree in Accounting and Finance, so guess book-keeping is under the same umbrella.

Just wondering though, there are two courses available to me:

ICB Practical Book-keeping and Sage Computerised Book-keeping.

I believe the first is a course about how to do it manually and the second how its done using a computerised method. Just wondering people's opinions about which of the two would be more beneficial to take on. After a little bit of research is appears the manual method course has better benefits in terms of gaining higher paid work after completion. But at the same time, the modern industry is all computerised so i don't really want to spend time and money on a course that perhaps uses 'outdated' methods. All advice will be welcomed

lcharm

Congrats on graduating.

I don't know much about this field but why book keeping and not ACA/ACCA or even CIMA if you're already educated in this field??

cjoffy

I will be learning ACCA as well. I know it sounds like i'm overloading myself here but it should be alright. I work full time as an accounts clerk and have applied for them to sponsor me to do ACCA (still awaiting a reply.) If i am unfortunate in my request i will probably have to seek new employment for a job that will sponsor me as i believe doing this is essential in the progression of my career. Due to my degree i am exempt from 7 out of the 14 ACCA exams which means i will have the remaining to do. This will be my main focus during my spare time and can hopefully get 3 exams completed a year for it. The book-keeping will be additional which i will more than likely fund myself, and they recommend 6 hours a week to complete the course in 6 months, 3 hours a week to complete in a year and so on. I feel i will be able to committ a lot of time to my ACCA study as well as perhaps 3 hours a week book-keeping in order to get it completed in a year. Thanks for you interest in my predicament

property.advert

I would not bother with ACCA. CIMA is where you should be focussing. Forget this meaningless book keeping course. Most of the ACCA/CIMA and courses stuff is rubbish that you will never need to know in real life but like your degree, it si a means to an end.

ACCA lies very very far behind CIMA in the world of business and yet you can often choose which one. ACCA is often looked upon as the local government poor relation. And it is.

ACCA is better than doing nothing but if you can choose, ditch it and do CIMA.

RoxyK

I did a reply earlier but lost it in the server downtime

Basically I agree with not bothering about the book-keeping course. I did a similar one and it is very basic and won't help further your career. Nor do companies use manual book keeping.

The Sage Computerised course won't help much either as companies always want someone with experience not just training. You're a lot better off concentrating on ACCA or CIMA.

Good luck!

jonnosm

property.advert wrote: »

I would not bother with ACCA. CIMA is where you should be focussing. Forget this meaningless book keeping course. Most of the ACCA/CIMA and courses stuff is rubbish that you will never need to know in real life but like your degree, it si a means to an end.

ACCA lies very very far behind CIMA in the world of business and yet you can often choose which one. ACCA is often looked upon as the local government poor relation. And it is.

ACCA is better than doing nothing but if you can choose, ditch it and do CIMA.

When I left uni I looked into this. I've started ACCA. The general opinion is that ACCA/ACA aren't too dissimilar now, with ACCA being more internationally recognised, but CIMA is better for you if you want to go into accounting in industry, mainly management accounting.

I spent ages looking into it, and this is the first time I've ever seen anyone of such an opinion towards ACCA. If you're wanting to do accounting in industry, though, I'd definately do CIMA.

I wouldn't bother with the book keeping course, it'd be a waste of time and money, especially if you're working for an accounting company.

cjoffy

Thanks for all your help, much appreciated

Pottedbeef

Have you decided which route to go down yet? If you end up training in practice for either ACA or ACCA then you will end up doing a great deal of bookkeepiing work especially in the early days. The practical experience would far outweigh any course you could take and you will end up doing a mix of manual and computerised record keeping anyway.

Bear in mind though that you will be doing a full time job as well as studying. I know from experiece (ACA) that it is a lot to do and you might struggle to find any spare time in which to do your bookkeeping work.

If you are hell bent on bookkeeping however, I would recommend doing it for a family member or friend initially until you get the measure of the scope of work involved. Remember it is people's livelihoods you will be having an impact on so first and foremostly you have to know what you are doing and have the time available to do a first rate job.

cjoffy

I haven't decided yet, i'm torn between ACCA and CIMA. Going to have to speak to my manager about it aswell i think. I appreciate what your saying about learning a lot of book-keeping whilst studying for one of these courses, i was thinking the same kind of thing.

I've noticed that for both ACCA and CIMA you need 3 years experience in a related profession in order to complete the course. I'm unsure whether my current job would cover this related profession. I work as a dibursement accounts clerk which sounds like it would be related although i don't carry out any usual accounting practices like tax computations, etc?? I do deal with nominal accounts and use journals, etc but that is pretty much as far as my job goes in terms of accounting. Do you think ACCA and CIMA would honor this as a related profession?

dazza.mk

cjoffy wrote: »

I've noticed that for both ACCA and CIMA you need 3 years experience in a related profession in order to complete the course. I'm unsure whether my current job would cover this related profession. I work as a dibursement accounts clerk which sounds like it would be related although i don't carry out any usual accounting practices like tax computations, etc?? I do deal with nominal accounts and use journals, etc but that is pretty much as far as my job goes in terms of accounting. Do you think ACCA and CIMA would honor this as a related profession?

Its not purely 3 years work in a related profession, rather 3 years relevant experience in areas of the syllabus, see CIMA below, main stipulation is that you need 18 months in core areas.

http://www.cimaglobal.com/Documents/ImportedDocuments/2309_brochure_web(1).pdf

In terms of CIMA / ACCA if you would focus on industry I chose CIMA , if auditing / taxation is of more interest to you then ACCA is probably a better option. Although the qualifications are pretty much interchangable.

Re: greater international recognition for ACCA, would probably query this, but not really relevant, if working in industry as long as the company recognises your qualification it does not really matter if the country does, unless you are interested in local tax / auditing, in which case the basic ACCA qualification may not be sufficient and you may need to recertify to join a local accounting body.

dazza.mk

Just to add I imagine your current role would fit fine against Basic Experience, although probably limited fit re: min 18 months core experience for CIMA.

From memory the only time I've seen ACCA practical experience details its probably more prescriptive than CIMA so they would probably view you experience in a similar fashion.