Members in practice

richiebkerry

Hi, I will shortly complete the AAT qualification and intend to become MAAT and eventually a FMAAT. I work in a manufacturing environment and intend to study towards the CIMA qualification. I’ve read an article about “Members in practice” which has intrigued me. Can somebody please explain what services I could carry out and charge for?

burg

You are allowed to perform services which you are competent in. In your case that would probably be bookkeeping, maybe accounts production depending on your experience. Tax would be unlikely which would be fundamental to an accountancy practice.

My advice would be to get yourself a role in a practice to get some practical experience. Not only would you gain experience in tax but also in the way in which practices run which is also essential.

Best of luck

richiebkerry

Thanks Ian. So I could draw up P&L's etc, can I sign off paperwork / accounts?

burg

that really depends if you have experience in the drafting of financial statements?

As I said before you are only allowed to perform services in which you are competent and the AAT grant a license for.

richiebkerry

Thanks. I would say I'm competent as I pull together two weekly P&L's for a large turnover business, balance sheet recs, ... KPI's etc etc. I think it's best if I call the AAT and discuss. The problem I find with the AAT is that you have to work really hard to get any answers.

Thanks again for your help.

A-Vic

burg wrote: »

You are allowed to perform services which you are competent in. In your case that would probably be bookkeeping, maybe accounts production depending on your experience. Tax would be unlikely which would be fundamental to an accountancy practice.

My advice would be to get yourself a role in a practice to get some practical experience. Not only would you gain experience in tax but also in the way in which practices run which is also essential.

Best of luck

I really agree with this we currently have a formar council management accountant doing work experience in our practise and sorry to say he really has a lot to learn about proceedures with clients and tax accounting before he trys to take on his own list (which he admitted himself)

Monsoon

richiebkerry wrote: »

Thanks. I would say I'm competent as I pull together two weekly P&L's for a large turnover business, balance sheet recs, ... KPI's etc etc. I think it's best if I call the AAT and discuss. The problem I find with the AAT is that you have to work really hard to get any answers.

Thanks again for your help.

A-Vic wrote: »

We currently have a formar council management accountant doing work experience in our practise and sorry to say he really has a lot to learn about proceedures with clients and tax accounting before he trys to take on his own list (which he admitted himself)

Agreed. Producing P&Ls etc is the easy bit. The hard bit about being in practice is the client and HMRC management, dealing with tax (you can't really get away with being in practice without at least some practical tax knowledge), dealing with HMRC, knowing what to ask, what not to ask...

If you can get some practice experience I really think that would be best, as the learning curve is so incredibly steep without it.

wildgoose1uk

Monsoon wrote: »

Agreed. Producing P&Ls etc is the easy bit. The hard bit about being in practice is the client and HMRC management, dealing with tax (you can't really get away with being in practice without at least some practical tax knowledge), dealing with HMRC, knowing what to ask, what not to ask...

If you can get some practice experience I really think that would be best, as the learning curve is so incredibly steep without it.

Hi Monsoon, Are you referring to managing the client's expectations as to vfm and working within HMRC deadlines or do you mean something else?

Monsoon

wildgoose1uk wrote: »

Hi Monsoon, Are you referring to managing the client's expectations as to vfm and working within HMRC deadlines or do you mean something else?

I don't know what vfm is, but I mean everything to do with client management and dealing with HMRC!

wildgoose1uk

sorry - vfm is value for money.

burg

I think what Jenni is getting at is it is very different dealing with the requirements of one client when working in industry. You need to learn to be able to think about a number of different clients, with different personalities, with different requirements, different ambitions, different industry sector rules, etc. It really is very different to just producing accounts and reports for one set of management.

HMRC is wholly different yet again and learning to deal with these is essential.

There is also the point of knowing in what is required in producing accounts, tax returns etc for outside organisations rather than for management use. Knowing what working papers to prepare and what records to keep. Key things to look out for, common errors, so on so on.

All things that are learned through practical experience.

I really do recommend getting some practical experience. It work improve your chances of success alot!