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From Start to Finish!

In this article, Steve Collings interviews Annette Smyth (Bluewednesday on the AccountancyStudents forums) and asks about her experience in completing AAT, starting ACCA and successfully gaining her membership status of ACCA.

You work in Practice for Bob Collyer and Co., what are your main duties?

My main duties are compiling the limited company accounts and related tax returns but I get involved with tax calculations, bookkeeping, VAT returns, research on accounting treatments, self assessment tax returns – the list goes on! That’s the advantage of working for a small practice, you get involved with everything, as the only things we don’t do is insolvency or audit work.

You’ve done AAT and now successfully completed ACCA, what made you choose ACCA?

I chose ACCA because I always wanted to work in practice and it was flexible enough to fit in with part time working hours. I looked at all the syllabi of each qualification, CIMA was discounted because I had enjoyed tax at AAT and there wasn’t enough tax in that syllabus (tax being especially useful in practice). ICAEW was discounted as I work part time and felt I would struggle to get a training contract. I also felt that ACCA had the best mix of skills which would help should I decide to go into industry one day.

How did you study for AAT and ACCA?

I started AAT in 2001, I previously worked in retail and the hours just wouldn’t fit in with childminders etc so had to give up my job. I decided to take advantage of the government retraining funding which paid for my foundation level. I then funded the next 2 levels myself. This was taken by day release at the local college which has an excellent pass rate for AAT. Between intermediate and technician I found out I was pregnant so I took a year off whilst I had my son.

As part of foundation required a job placement I worked for an AAT qualified financial controller in a local hotel. I enjoyed this work and found I was given more and more responsibility so I carried on doing this whilst studying intermediate. It was through this placement that I found my current employer as one of my colleagues knew he was looking for staff, he came and interviewed me and I’ve worked for him ever since.

I then negotiated with this employer to fund my courses for ACCA. I decided to take taught courses with BPP and stayed with them throughout the whole study time. As this type of study is quite intensive I had to organise extra study time for myself around the children but I had help from my parents, my parents in law and my husband to give me the precious time I needed, especially near to exam time.

Which papers did you find particularly challenging?

I didn’t enjoy the management accounting parts of either syllabus although I appreciate the need for the all round experience and I have found the costing parts useful when dealing with some clients. The papers I knew I would struggle with were the management accounting papers and the audit papers. I had no audit experience but was told that as I had practice experience, the audit papers would be straightforward. I chose advanced audit and advanced tax as my option papers as they seemed to fit in best with what I do at work. My most difficult paper was advanced audit although I did find that more interesting than the auditing paper at fundamental level.

P2 advanced corporate reporting is a hard paper to study but it has to be the one I enjoyed the most. That’s my kind of paper as I enjoy the rules side of accountancy!

How did you motivate yourself to study given that you have family commitments?

I used the family I have to help me study. The children were fairly good and it got easier as they got older. I studied in the afternoons and at weekends when my husband was at home. I had to be disciplined in how I studied in order to not let the children miss out on their extracurricular activities such as swimming lessons etc. I was well known to take my textbooks to the swimming pool – it’s amazing how much extra reading time you can find when you need to!

What advice would you give to students who struggle with papers such as auditing papers or management accounting papers?

You just have to make yourself do it! I never considered giving up because I knew I would finish the qualification. I found the theoretical papers harder to revise for and had to force myself to put the time in but I knew I would feel better once they were done. I never wanted to go into an exam thinking I hadn’t put enough work in.

I also gave myself a break. I never studied on a Friday afternoon and made sure I used that time to catch up with friends or do something with the children. As I had studied the previous 4 days I didn’t feel guilty about it and I enjoyed that time so much more.

Students often say they have failed an exam if they find their performance was not as good as they would have liked; what is your advice on how they should deal with this given there is a long wait for the results?

I just forgot about the exams (or tried to) as whatever I had done I couldn’t change now. I attempted not to discuss the paper as I knew there were so many marks you could get without having the exact right answer. I also tried (but failed every time) not to look at the answers when they were published. I have to thank ACCA for not putting them on the website until a long time after the exams by which time I had forgotten what I had put anyway.

That didn’t stop me counting down the weeks, then days until the results.

Would you recommend revision courses or do you find taught classes are sufficient enough to pass?

It was a matter of finances for me. I did the taught courses for every paper and did the revision myself with the recommended publishers revision guides. However for papers I thought I would struggle with such as advanced tax and advanced corporate reporting I took the revision courses too, it took the pressure off the amount of revision I had to structure for myself. If I had had all courses funded I would have taken revision courses every time but I count myself lucky with the funding I had and just put the extra effort in.

Do you plan any further studies?

One of the things that is not covered in either qualification is payroll so I have considered (and purchased the books for) the AAT payroll qualification but I think I will just use the books for necessary CPD.

I have always been interested in and enjoyed the tax part of ACCA and have been thinking of taking CTA but the high failure rate scares me along with the hours of study required for that course. In balance I think I want to be a mother for a while but it is something I may consider in the future.

What are you doing with all the spare time you now have now studying is complete for you?

I’m enjoying reading all the books that were put on hold whilst I was studying. As soon as the exam session was over I could pick up novels again but once the courses started again, I had to put them down and read textbooks in their place. My housework also suffered so I’ve slowly caught up with that.

I’m also spending time with my family to try and make up for the time that we missed whilst I was studying. I realised that this is the first time that my son has not seen me with my head in textbooks so am going to make the most of that.

AccountancyStudents would like to thank Annette Smyth for her time and help in compiling this article.