BDO school leaver programme 2017.

I did work experience at KPMG for a week. Only shadowed one of the days in the audit department and ruled out that it wasn't for me. I have applied for tax at BDO and accepted my offer. What firm do you work for?

Did you do CFAB or ATT before? Which one would you recommend doing?
The other trainees said it was challenging and enjoyed it. I guess it depends what service line and team you join.

Thanks for the advice.

It's really good that you did some Audit shadowing, you're already way more clued-up than 99% of the people applying! I'd really recommend you also shadow tax, and for more than one day, again, applying for a job with no experience of what the actual day job entails is being blind.

I didn't no, I did a degree so came straight in on a grad scheme onto ACA. CFAB is simply the first 6 of the 15 ACA exams, so in a way yes I did CFAB first before ACA.

If you're in tax, ATT is far more useful. CFAB only has one tax paper and you don't really learn that much from it. ATT has 10 times as much tax content and would be much more useful for someone working in tax than CFAB or even ACA.

Like I said, lots of my colleagues do enjoy it, they probably would have enjoyed it whilst shadowing and still applied, whereas had I shadowed I definitely would not have applied, which is why I really would encourage you to shadow tax for a week.

OR, go to Uni! Gives you much more options, and you could do Summer Internships with these firms each summer to get a real taste of what you want to do and three years to think about it/reorientate your career.

I'll see if I can get some shadowing in tax then. Thanks.

But if I did CFAB and ACA and say in the future I wanted to change service lines it would be better than with ATT and CTA? Also, how hard are the exams lol

Yeah I definitely dont want to go to uni though as I know its not something i'd enjoy.

Do you think maybe its the service line you don't enjoy rather than the job itself?

Oh no it's definitely not just the service line, Tax is far less awful than Audit, I've shadowed audit before.

If you want to change jobs, then ACA is definitely more useful as it teaches you Accounting, Law and some basic Business/Finance/Economics, where as ATT/CTA is just tax, it's pretty much useless for any non-tax job.

ACA exams are insane. The content isn't necessarily difficult, but having to study them in such a short period of time, whilst working 50-60 hours full time, makes it very difficult. They're much harder than A-Level exams, imagine if you had a full-time job, and then they have you just two months to self-teach and learn an entire A-Level just in the evenings and weekend around work, with just 2-3 days in college with a tutor who tries to cover the entire A-Levels in those days - insane.

As long as you're good at cramming and memorising things quickly, and maybe use some of your holiday, you'll be fine for CFAB.

ATT is more chilled from what I gather, you just sit exams in May and all at once so you have much longer to study/revise the material. I've never heard anyone complain that the ATT is too difficult, unlike the CFAB/ACA.

Im glad to hear tax is a better service line

Which tax do you work in?

i'm kind of already doing that. I self-teach AS and A2 in one year on weekends/evenings lol. So i'm already used to it so hopefully that shouldn't be a problem.

ATT is chilled but CFAB would be more useful? Or nothing like that? Which ones more recognised?

I'm on a rotating scheme so I've done pretty much all taxes, VAT & Indirect, personal, corporate etc.

ATT is more useful for working in Tax
CFAB is more useful for working in Non-Tax.

Why not do ATT, and then ACA? That's what many in my firm do.
They do the ATT in their first two years, which helps with their job, and then do ACA to help with their better career prospects. Best of both worlds. Having ATT also gets you either 2 or 3 exemptions from the 15 ACA exams, I can't remember how many, but definitely at least 2.

Oh, which AS/A2 do you self-teach? I'm considering doing the same once I've finished my ACA.

I'm on a rotating scheme so I've done pretty much all taxes, VAT & Indirect, personal, corporate etc.

ATT is more useful for working in Tax
CFAB is more useful for working in Non-Tax.

Why not do ATT, and then ACA? That's what many in my firm do.
They do the ATT in their first two years, which helps with their job, and then do ACA to help with their better career prospects. Best of both worlds. Having ATT also gets you either 2 or 3 exemptions from the 15 ACA exams, I can't remember how many, but definitely at least 2.

Oh, which AS/A2 do you self-teach? I'm considering doing the same once I've finished my ACA.

Oh okay, which one do you enjoy the most, if any?
I will be in the private client services team, i'm actually looking forward to it

Oh okay! I'll see how the first two years go and then take it from there i guess

What are you considering to self-teach, A-levels? Have you not already got them?
Last year I did business and biology. This year im doing economics and accounting.

Hi there,
I completely understand what your saying as I'm looking to go into an accounting programme.
Do you have rough numbers on how many people start the programme to how many finish the programme? Are the stats reasonable?
Also do you have any tips on CFAB/ACA? How do you think Is the best way to revise?
Is there any resources that you know of that someone can use before they start the exam to give them a head start?

I prefer the more corporate-focused taxes as you actually get to go to client meetings and help businesses save money which might lead to them hiring more staff. I didn't enjoy Private Client as it's 100% office based and is mostly focused on helping the super-rich non-doms help keep their millions offshore and tax free, which doesn't sit well on my conscience.

I have Politics, History and Business A-Levels, but I'd like to do the Science ones too as I always regretted not doing them and am considering going into Med School later in life which they would be a prerequisite for.

What firm do you work for?
I'll be joining the medical specialist accounts and tax team so its a little different I think.

What degree did you do?
Fair enough, do you not feel as if you're wasting your time now though? How long have you got until you finish your ACA?

Anyone got an AC on the 23rd?

How did your AC go? I had mine yesterday and haven't heard back from them so I was wondering if anyone knew how long they take to give you the AC outcome?

How did your AC go? I had mine yesterday and haven't heard back from them so I was wondering if anyone knew how long they take to give you the AC outcome?

How did your AC go? I had mine yesterday and haven't heard back from them so I was wondering if anyone knew how long they take to give you the AC outcome?

I got told my outcome the next day..what office did you apply for?

I applied for the London Baker Street office, but for the internship program! I received a call from them today about an hour ago but I was on the tube so couldn't pick up, would they call if it's a rejection?