The ACCA qualification is an internationally recognized professional accounting credential offered by the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), a UK-based body. Being a qualified ACCA, an accountant can find his place in various capacities in an organization like Financial Planner, Corporate Financial Planner and Expert, Management Consultant, Investment Banker, Chief Financial Officer, etc.
ACCA Course
The ACCA course has wide coverage of chartered accountancy having its span elaborated to Accounting, Business Finance, Financial Reporting, Auditing, Financial Management, Taxation, etc. The ACCA course has a duration of approximately 1-7 years covering a total of 13 online exams. The entire subjects are divided into 3 levels namely, Knowledge, Skills and Professional where certain exemptions are available at different entry levels.
ACCA Eligibility
The eligibility criteria for ACCA are 10+2 exam pass with minimum 65% as aggregate in Mathematics or Accounts and English while at least 50% in other subjects. Students without the aforesaid qualification must start with the ACCA diploma course for entering the main ACCA course. However, different entry points to the ACCA course are available from graduation also with certain exemptions.
ACCA Syllabus
The ACCA syllabus is divided into 3 parts like Knowledge, Skill and Professional sections which are discussed briefly below:
Knowledge Level
It includes the following topics.
- F1: Business and Technology (BT)- It involves the overall knowledge on the structure, governance, and organizational management of the organization from the angle of an accountant in a team-based business scenario.
- F2: Management Accounting (MA)- It includes various aspects of cost/management accounting and budgeting.
- F3: Financial Accounting (FA)- This includes cost accounting and decision-making techniques, use of business mathematics, computer spreadsheets, etc.
Skill Level
This is an elevation of the Knowledge level that demand application of the knowledge learned with further application of practical financial acumen. It has 6 following papers.
- F4: Corporate and Business Law (LW)- Classification of cost with application of cost and decision-making techniques.
- F5: Performance Management (PM)- Budgeting, forecasting and performance measurement skills with variance analysis.
- F6: Taxation (TX)- Budgeting, forecasting and cost accounting methods in taxation.
- F7: Financial Reporting (FR)- Application knowledge of all above parameters and presentation.
- F8: Audit and Assurance (AA)- Standard costing and analysis of variance.
- F9: Financial Management (FM)- This includes evaluation of risk, capital management, investment, etc.
Strategic Professional Level
This imparts strategic leadership applied skills having 2 parts – compulsory and optional as mentioned below.
Compulsory Part:
- P1: Strategic Business Leader (SBL)- Risk management, ethical structure, and value-base judgement, etc.
- P2: Strategic Business Reporting (SBR)- Foresight of regulatory changes, reporting issues, evaluation, and application of current and upcoming developments, etc.
Optional Part: One has to select any 2 of the 4 sections mentioned below.
- P3: Advanced Financial Management (AFM)
- P4: Advanced Performance Management (APM)
- P5: Advanced Taxation (ATX)
- P6: Advanced Audit and Assurance (AAA)
ACCA Exemptions
Depending on the qualifications, ACCA aspirants can obtain exemptions at various levels of the ACCA exam as discussed below.
- Class 12 Pass out: Exempted from Foundation/Diploma course.
- Graduates and Post Graduates: Exempted for 4 papers (3 papers from Knowledge and 1 from Skill level. However, there is a recent development. Any B.Com pursuing students from ACCA affiliated Universities will get a 5 papers exemption from Knowledge and Skill levels.
- CA Inter: They must write 8 exams out of 13.
- CA Qualified: A total of 9 paper exemptions are available for a qualified CA. Thus, they need to sit for only 4 papers at the Professional level.
ACCA Salary
The salary of ACCA varies at different levels. For example, an entry level ACCA qualified accountant can get a salary of 3.5 lakhs on average which can go up to > 9.5 lakhs for an ACCA qualified finance manager.
It has been well established that ACCA is a highly rewarding accounting career for a hard-core finance professional. Since ACCA is a globally accepted, much coveted professional accounting credential, pursuing ACCA is highly worthwhile based on the high value return and the career scope.
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