ACCA practicing certificate

cornflower

I hope to pass my final exams in December (waiting on P1 and P2 which I sat in June) and am now starting to think about what I will do after I qualify. I wouldn't mind setting up on my own but have noticed ACCA make this almost impossible to do after qualification until you wait another 2 to 3 years before they will grant you a practicing certificate. Does anyone know the reasoning behind this? They seem to be the strictest body and only body that place such draconian rules on people who are qualified accountants.

stefanboro

It's mainly to enhance the status of being able to advertise as a Chartered Certified - the harder it is to obtain this ability the more exclusive it becomes.

That being said I know accountants who whilst training got a charted "mentor" - this allowed them to gain the experience crtieria.

I studied ACCA all the way up to the P exams but have stopped because frankly a lot of the learning material is not relevant. Instead I am trying to blitz ATT as fast as I humanly can and then go for CTA - my understanding this CTA is slightly more relaxed about full membership.

Anyway, I'm waffling. Best of luck!

RAS

Agreed the ACCA rules make life very difficult for anyone wanting to set up on their own. I have an ACCA practising certificate, but the process of applying for one was a bit of a nightmare and very time consuming. To some degree you can see where they are coming from, they need to be confident that before someone can practice under the ACCA banner the individual has suffiicent experience and competence.

Probably if you want to run a small practice then ACCA is not the best route to go down, AAT and ATT is likely to be sufficient and alot easier.

Many people trip up on the ACCA rules and not aware of the restrictions until it is too late. Not sure if ACCA make all of this clear enough, probably deliberately.