Retraining - Too expensive

persa

OP, do you have a a degree? (Doesn't have to be accountancy related.)

You say you have debt - are you managing this, or is it likely you will have to go down the IVA/bankruptcy route in the future? (You didn't say what level of debt you had.)

What kind of accountancy work would you ideally like to do? (Bearing in mind that you can't just go self-employed straight away, people will want to see you've racked up years of experience with a good firm before wanting to rely on you and you alone.)

Just a couple of questions that will help us point you in the right direction.

Sambucus_Nigra

westv wrote: »

Isn't it said that the best builders sometimes have the worst houses? :rotfl:

They may say that but in my experience, that's complete bullsh1t.

Most of the builders I know live in lovely houses.

sdt1986

persa wrote: »

OP, do you have a a degree? (Doesn't have to be accountancy related.)

You say you have debt - are you managing this, or is it likely you will have to go down the IVA/bankruptcy route in the future? (You didn't say what level of debt you had.)

What kind of accountancy work would you ideally like to do? (Bearing in mind that you can't just go self-employed straight away, people will want to see you've racked up years of experience with a good firm before wanting to rely on you and you alone.)

Just a couple of questions that will help us point you in the right direction.

Thanks for the reply and sorry for getting back so late, I'm not on that often plus I've been in hospital due to kidney stones

Anyway's no I've not got any degree, I did a years studying as a mature student for a marketing management but found it not to be suitable as I was getting more and more into debt learning stuff that I had learnt by working and having common sense, I just couldn't face getting 3 more years worth of debt, this was as a full time student, glad I did it with no regrets but it just didn't work out.

I'm in 16.5k debt roughly, 6k student, 4k ccj, 4k loan in my mums name and then bits and bats so there is no IVA/bankruptcy option, poorly managing but scraping by.

I want to do accountancy for small businesses, i.e all my mates are tradesmen that are self employed, as are many of my family, these sort of people are the clients I'd be looking to look after.

sdt1986

What support can I get from the dole office for courses etc? I don't want to do any of there courses because I want to be able to take a job should one come up, any advice on that?

hcb42

it's an expensive career to subsidise with training, and i would imagine a job would rule out funding. (although OU might be ok, for low income)

persa

Hope you feel better soon.

With no degree to your name, AAT is probably your best route into accountancy, however the level of debt you have and the fact that you have CCJs against you, does raise some issues. (See here: http://www.aat.org.uk/content/item125382/)

Before going any further, I would advise contacting AAT to discuss whether your application to join the body would be successful. If the answer is no, you can bet that other accountancy bodies will say the same thing and you should pursue a different career.

If AAT are happy to consider an application, your next step is to look at that £6.5k of debt in your name and how you can pay it off. Why did you rack it up in the first place? (Plus that other £4k in your mum's name - how did that come about?)

If the debt arose because of an unexpected change in circumstances (e.g. redundancy, bereavement, etc), you need to consider what would happen if those unfortunate circumstances happened again. Would you still be able to service your debts, or would they start to grow and grow? You need to bear in mind that you can pass all your professional exams and get struck off if you enter into an IVA. £6.5k of debt may not point towards that direction right now, but you need to get comfortable you won't end up down that road at any point in the future. Accountancy exams are hard work and take a long time to study for and pass - it would be awfully sad to put all that effort in and have your career cut short.

Some accountancy courses may run at your local college (including some parts of the AAT, I think) - if you're on income based JSA, you may be eligible to a fee waiver. Worth checking. With your college though, not the Job Centre.

I believe the OU offer accountancy degrees, but you need to bear in mind that one of those does not make you an accountant. You would then need to go on and sit professional exams - although if you did the degree route, you would probably then go for ACCA/ACA/CA/CIMA instead of AAT.

If you're based in Scotland, you might get some help through ILA Scotland, but it's only a couple of hundred per year.

I was advised that the Job Centre could allow an employment related course as a bit of a one off - but generally if you study full time, you lose the right to claim JSA. I would suggest doing your research as to where you would like to study and when, then raising the question when you sign on next - the Job Centre staff can be very helpful.

The aim may be to go self employed eventually, but it would be incredibly unusual for someone to do accountancy training, pass the exams and open their own practice, even if it was tiny. You really would want to get some professional experience with a firm, first.

sdt1986

Thanks for the excellent post.

In response to a few of your questions...

Here is a breakdown of my debt and reasonings.

£6,921 - Student Loan payable in 2012 (the biggest/costliest mistake that I don't regret)

£3,488 - Loan in my mums name, this came about because I got a 1.5k when I was working in my first full time job, 1 month after out of the blue I was made redundant and was foolish with my spending whilst looking for new work etc and it racked up, I eventually got a 5k loan to cover all oustanding things and was paying it off fine, I then lost a tooth and it cost 2k to replace so I got another loan in my mums name for interest rate purposes for consolidation purposes and to cover tooth, this was a good few years ago (2006) it was initially a balance outstanding of £7,903 and since then the only debt I've had is a few hundred here and there to people or arrears on my rent etc, I'm now a better person with money other than the student fiasco.

£821 An overdraft that I forgot about

Then there is just bits and bats to family and friends

All in all I'm much much better with money and if I weren't in the debt I'm in I'd most definitely be able to afford so much more in life and probably be having savings every month when I work.

crispy_chris

Just thought I'd say that I work in the financial sector and recently had to recruit for a non-customer facing non-cash role in the company. People that applied for the job would be credit checked and any arrears would mean that they fail. We had an chap who told us that they had a CCJ and we told them not to bother applying because they would fail the credit check.

Fair enough by the time it comes to you actually applying for an accountancy job you may have sorted your finances but just to make you aware that it is definitely a factor

Any

crispy_chris wrote: »

Just thought I'd say that I work in the financial sector and recently had to recruit for a non-customer facing non-cash role in the company. People that applied for the job would be credit checked and any arrears would mean that they fail. We had an chap who told us that they had a CCJ and we told them not to bother applying because they would fail the credit check.

Fair enough by the time it comes to you actually applying for an accountancy job you may have sorted your finances but just to make you aware that it is definitely a factor

It is a factor in few jobs, such as banks etc, but for role in a finance team in a company it is highly unlikely you will be credit checked...

I've never ever been and don't know anyone who had been tbh., unless they went to work in a bank.

sdt1986

Any wrote: »

It is a factor in few jobs, such as banks etc, but for role in a finance team in a company it is highly unlikely you will be credit checked...

I've never ever been and don't know anyone who had been tbh., unless they went to work in a bank.

That's been my experience in finding jobs in general. Most companies are fine but I've more chance of plaiting fog than getting a job in a bank which is unfortunate considering the majority of jobs in west yorkshire are those in banks (especially as I live in Halifax) It's bloody annoying as well because I clearly want to get out of debt by working but they decide that I am unsuitable because of said debt, it's a joke.