Simple answer is you need to follow a specific career path, working for some years in a firm of Chartered Accountants with a specific training program, under a training contract, to qualify as a CA. And pass the exams of course which I think a significant number of UK graduates fail.

The is the Association of Accounting Technicians which might be more suitable but this would depend on your wife's needs and aspirations. Good qualification, but not to the level of a CA.

There are various colleges who offer training for accountants, These are pretty helpful and may have careers advisers. That is where I would suggest your wife looks.

Eric Mc is a well known CA on PH I do not doubt he would offer some very pertinent advice. Good luck to your wife in her choices.

Hi

The formal "accounting" qualifications from the recognised "bodies" are all looked on as "professional" qualifications and therefore tend to have quite a few extra requirements added to them on top of the "mere" studying course materials and passing exams.

Trainee Chartered Accountants all have to spend a number of years working as "apprentices" in a practising firm of Chartred Accountants before they can get their qualificiation - even if they have passed the exams.

Certified accountants (which is what I am) don't insist on this unless the accountant wishes to work as a "practising" accountant (as opposed to being an accountant in industry or general industry.

Management Accountants (CIMA) are not so insistent on this (as far as I am aware) as CIMA qualified people tend to work in industry.

AAT is a "lower grade" qualification compared to the full blown professional qualification and it can be used as a stepping stone to the profession. It depends on her ambitions and the time and effort she wants to put into it.

Becoming a qualified professional accountant is not easy and does require a fair amount of study and sacrifice.

I would doubt that very much, to me they are very separate roles.

A bookkeeper would do the day-to-day accounting work, like invoicing, expenses, bank reconciliations, payroll, management reports (monthly P+L, cash forecasting etc) and preparing the 'books' for year end. Some smaller companies get away without a bookkeeper. Some probably shouldn't try to!

An accountant would take those books and analyse them and produce the statutory reports, as well as advise throughout the year on all those aspects of tax law or higher level advice. Very few accountants I know would get into the detail of bookkeeping (i.e. checking your bank statement against paid invoices, chasing overdue accounts etc).

Obviously there can be overlap, a bookkeeper might know tax law, and an accountant might do bookkeeping or payroll for smaller businesses (although they'd probably just sub it out). It's unlikely a bookkeeper would do a full set of accounts nowadays.

A good bookkeeper can act as the buffer between management and the accountant, and is a very important role for a smaller business, because many company directors are quite hopeless at bookkeeping and don't see beyond what's in the bank account or invoices floating in an "unpaid" status.

Also worth bearing in mind that a bookkeeper could work for quite a few companies on a freelance basis, many businesses might only need a few hours or a day per week.

Thanks a lot for all the replies. Most helpful.

Mrs P is again surprised and impressed at the response from PH! - I am not surprised, just impressed.

anyhow - she's spoken to a local contact who runs a small book keeping firm and who echoed much of the advice given here.

Thanks again, Ace