PQ magazine, January 2017

PQ magazine www.pqmagazine.com / www.pqjobs.co.uk

January 2017

Inside: our Annual Bumper Quiz! Sponsored by the accountancy bodies

NOW IS A GREAT TIME TO BE A PQ

We may live in increasing uncertain times, but one certainty for 2017 is that talented part qualifieds will still be in big demand, says Hays Accountancy & Finance’s Karen Young.

In fact, Young goes as far as saying that there has never been a better time to be a student accountant, as demand for your services from all sectors is outstripping supply.

The Hays UK Salary & Recruiting Trends 2017 guide has just been released, and Young revealed the salaries of PQs increased by an average of 2% in the past 12 months. This is good news when you see that the overall salary increases last year in the accountancy and finance profession as a whole was 1.4%.

The survey found that the average salary of a PQ accountant in 2016 was £25,337. This is expected to rise to £25,865 in 2017, representing a 2.1% increase.

That doesn’t mean that PQs

Hays’ Karen Young

are content with their pay packets – 58% said they weren’t happy with their current salary level.

It appears PQs are also not slow at coming forward when it comes to asking for a pay rise.

One in three PQs have asked for a rise in the past 12 months, again more than the average for the finance profession as a whole (29%). Of the 32% who asked for that rise half were successful. Young explains that this rate of success is pretty much in line with the wider finance profession.

While nigh on all (97%) of PQs feel they have the skills necessary for their current role, over half say there is no scope for career progression in their current organisation. Hardly surprising then that more than half those PQs surveyed (59%) say they anticipate moving jobs within the next 12 months, and 39% say they are anticipating a move within the next six months.

• Check out the Hays salary checker on page 26.

ACA computer-based exam resources available Find out more at icaew.com/cbe

Deadline for awards extended

We have given you just a little more time to get your nominations to us for the PQ awards.

You now have until Monday 9 January to get your entries to us – that’s your new ‘D-Day’! Come on, isn’t it time you got the recognition your CV deserves? Or maybe you want to enter someone from your office. Our independent judges will be meeting in January to decide who has made it through to the awards night at the Café de Paris. And what a night that will be! All we need is 250 words for now. Go to www.pqmagazine.co.uk to download the nomination form.

NEW

Introducing an exciting new range of 2017 CIMA courses We’ve listened to your feedback and completely redesigned all our courses for 2017, so you can develop the knowledge and exam confidence you need to pass first time.

It’s a better way of learning that’s built around you.

comment PQ

CONTENTS

News 08ACCA exam feedback What was good and what was bad?

10CIMA/CIPFA tie-up New path to the CGMA opened up 12Maths skills CIMA wants to help you improve your maths Features, etc 06Mind your Ps&Qs Is a 50% pass rate too low? Why 10 hours a week is not enough study time; and another film critic writes…

14Annual Bumper Quiz Giving you the chance to show off your knowledge – and win a fantastic Apple Watch!

16PQ Awards 2017 The deadline is extended – make the most of it 18ACCA project How to become the perfect accountant

32CIMA lives We caught up with

two top part qualifieds to find out what makes them tick 33AAT exams What synoptic tests are and how to pass them 34Careers #1 Ensure your skills are relevant and up-to-date 35Careers #2 Life at Cyrus Controls; our book review; and the best of social media 38Fun stuff Great giveaways too!

The columnists Robert Bruce Corporate pay and why accountants must take control 8 Prem Sikka Government proposals won’t stop ‘fat cattery’ 10 Carl Lygo Will UK colleges turn to the Middle East?

12

23CIMA exams Changes to the

Subscribe to PQ magazine It’s FREE – see page 37 or go to www.pqmagazine.co.uk

24PQ survey We want to know

ABC July 2015 – June 2016

Certificate in Business Accounting Syllabus; and another great giveway from First Intuition

32,238

about your study experience

26Salary checker So are you

getting paid what you should be?

28CIPFA spotlight Institute

unveils new gender equality initiative

29Let’s get technical Are you

Time to turn to twitter

January 2017

ready to sit Level 2 Bookkeeping Transactions (AQ2016)?

30ICAEW focus It’s time to get ready for the new CBEs

Publisher’s statement: We send a digital issue of the magazine to an additional 9,201 requested readers Free to all accountancy students Annual subscription: £35 (£50 overseas)

The ACCA may have to take a serious look at its exam processes and create a clear policy about publishing articles prior to exam sessions. We have been told the P2 exam team released an article on IFRS 13 just six days before the December exam, after all the revision courses had finished. And via twitter we found out that fair value appeared in question 3. I was able to confirm all this while on a trip to Birmingham on the day of the exam, thanks Matt for that quick reply. A sensible rule might be that the ACCA does not publish any new exam support material in the two weeks prior the exams.

Interestingly, I initially agreed with AAT CEO Mark Farrar when he tweeted: “Good luck to all those @YourAAT members involved. Turn off twitter and focus!” Then we discovered that the ACCA had quietly released the September exam Q&As. We went straight on Facebook, LinkedIn and twitter to tell students and tutors the news. As Open Tuition’s John Moffat said, the September exams were published because of the change in the format of the exams. What will be interesting to see is whether the ACCA now publishes the December exam Q&As. Or will they stick to the hybrid approach of publishing a combination of September/December questions, which is the policy now?

We need your views PQ magazine has joined forces with recruitment experts Hays to try to discover if employers are treating you right. Some four years ago we asked many of the same questions, and I am intrigued to know if your world has changed. But we can’t the get to the answers without you! Our survey will only take a few minutes to complete and it will hopefully help us shape how future PQs are treated. So come on, go to http://feedback.hays.com/f/1089278/1848/ – you could to win a Kindle Fire, too (see page 24 for for all the details).

Graham Hambly, PQ magazine editor – graham@pqaccountant.com

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PQ have your say

email graham@pqaccountant.com Is 50% enough?

I have been following a discussion on the ACCA Global Wall Facebook page about pass rates and wondered if any fellow students agreed with Syed Ammar Gillani? He set the cat among the pigeons when he suggested the pass mark in ACCA exams should be 60% to ensure only ‘quality’ accountants are qualifying! He believes that 50% is just not high enough, and to be honest I have to agree with him.

I am a former AAT student and the pass mark for AAT exams is a very tough 70%. They have just introduced a system of

distinctions and merits, too. So a student who passes the AAT exams with 70%–79% just gets a straight pass. If you want a distinction then you would need over 90% in the

assessment. Not many people get one of those.

The problem is that the pass rates of some papers are already extremely low. If the pass mark was just arbitrarily put up some pass rates could drop below 20%! But as ACCA moves to CBEs this would perhaps be the perfect time to look at pass mark. The F1 to F4 pass rates are much higher than the paper ones that follow.

Name and address supplied The editor says: An interesting and bold idea! What do you think?

Our star letter writer wins a fantastic PQ memory stick!

Keep it real

I agree with your ‘Old Un’ letter writer in the last issue of PQ who is sceptical about the tutor who said that you can pass CIMA by studying just 10 hours a week.

I’m now CIMA qualified (thankfully!) but I can tell you I was studying 10 hours a day on the Saturdays and Sundays leading up to my final exams.

I’ve never had a problem with studying hard – after all, if these exams were easy to pass then they wouldn’t be worth having. The sacrifice was worthwhile (and I now have a pretty hectic social life!). All I’m asking for is a little bit of reality – those embarking on CIMA should know what they are in for.

Pete Smith, by email

Keep it neat

As a former examiner for an accountancy body I was interested to read your article ‘You need to be neater’ (PQ, December 2016). I can’t stress to exam sitters enough the importance of presenting your

Keep it cheap

I enjoyed the article on the Kay Me fashion label in the latest PQ, and well done to Ms Kemi for her achievements (and her lovely

clothes). But £300 for a dress to wear to work (our offices are on an industrial estate)? Really? How much do you think PQs get paid?

Maybe one day, when I’m qualified (although that day seems a very long way off!).

A skint trainee just off to Oxfam

Keep it to yourself

Sorted, thanks to pqjobs.co.uk

scripts in a neat, readable way.

I speak from bitter experience.

There’s nothing worse from the examiner’s point of view than having to wade through endless illegible scripts. Students must help the examiner to give them a pass – I know students who have failed

simply because the examiner could not read their handwriting. Well done PQ magazine for highlighting this issue. I’d like to think students will take note of this advice but I fear this is probably wishful thinking.

Name and address supplied

Can I ask who did your review in the magazine for the film ‘The Accountant’? You gave the movie three stars (PQ, December 2016).

Then I read ACCA PQ’s Craig Coda’s review you put online. He gave it four stars and said it was “a brilliant movie”. Seriously? Ben Affleck is so two-dimensional – he can’t act his way out of a paper bag, even if it was full of receipts!

In my humble opinion this movie is worth one, maybe two stars at most. You wait for ages for a ‘blockbuster’ with the accountant as the lead and this is what you get! I am married to a lawyer and we went to see it together. Her post-movie comment was that lawyers are just so much sexier than accountants. How could I argue my case after that?

Eddie Burnett, by email The editor says: Well that was me Eddie, sorry, I just didn’t think it was that bad.

PQ Magazine Unit 3 Block A, Kingfisher Heights, Bramwell Way, Royal Docks, London E16 2GQ | Phone: 020 7216 6444 | Email: graham@pqaccountant.com Website: www.pqmagazine.co.uk | Editor/publisher: Graham Hambly graham@pqaccountant.com | Advertising manager: Polly Thrasivoulou polly@pqaccountant.com Associate editor: Adam Riches | Art editor: Tim Parker | Subscriptions: dom@pqaccountant.com | Contributors: Robert Bruce, Prem Sikka, Carl Lygo, Tony Kelly, Phil Gammon | Origination and print services by Classified Central Media If you have any problems with delivery, or if you want to change your delivery address, please email dom@pqaccountant.com

Published by PQ Publishing © PQ Publishing 2016

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PQ news

ROBERT BRUCE Corporate pay: why accountants must raise their game It is time for the accountancy profession to roll up its sleeves and bring sanity back into the latest corporate governance debate. And by doing so claw back what ought to be its responsibility in the first place.

The way that boardroom remuneration is justified has long been a scandal.

The parts of reports that provide explanations (supposedly) for boardroom pay have become the fastest-growing chunk of the document. Boards of directors hire consultants who provide astonishingly intricate justifications for the huge remuneration. They do not provide explanations that anyone outside the consultancy world can understand.

What is provided is obfuscation. And accountants have let this area of expertise slip out of their grip. But the tide is turning. The public are making a fuss. The result is likely to be a mess. Any calculation of the ratio of pay between office cleaners, boardroom members and median employees is likely to finish up as something over which arguments can stretch from here to the South Pole without any resolution or satisfaction.

The consultancy world will again pour a sticky mass of incomprehensibility over it. What we need is the accountancy profession to step up, with the principles of integrated reporting, and the idea that reports and accounts have to be fair, balanced and understandable, firmly in its mind. And produce transparent, clear, short, figure-based arguments that will have the populace cheering. n Robert Bruce is an award-winning writer on accountancy for The Times

ACCA exam feedback ACCA F7 candidates worrying about the amount of C answers in the MCQs, P1 sitters struggling to write a letter, and an outcry over P7 time pressure. These were just some of the comments we received about the December sitting.

Time management seems a real headache for P7 sitters. As one PQ put it: “This exam is driving me crazy with its time pressure.”

Another said: “Why so little time? I feel like crying already.”

It seems many P level students are getting bogged down with Q1, which then puts real pressure on the rest of the exam.

HTFT’s Clare Finch stressed that with most of the P papers the best technique is for students to start

with a section B question. She also felt that once students master exam timing they are ‘almost qualified’ – that is the key to your success in the exam hall.

One of her papers is P2. The ACCA examining team published an article on 2 December on IFRS

13 (the exam was on 8 December), and it appeared in Q3. The worry here is many students in revision mode may have missed this vital piece.

While F7 sitters felt the exam this time around was easier than the September test, many PQs were worried about the amount of Cs they put down in the MCQs. As a sitter said to our tweet: “OMG true true!! Lots of Cs made me wonder.”

P1 sitters found Q4 confusing and Q1 a ‘strange mix’. In Q1 they were asked to write a letter to shareholders, for 18 marks. One PQ called it ‘brutal’ and many students had to admit they just didn’t know what to put in the letter.

ACCA releases Q&As for F5-F9

ACCA students will have been both ‘shocked’ and ‘delighted’ with the news that the association released the F5-F9 September exam ‘Questions and Answers’.

However there was some concern about just how near it all was to the December exams – PQ magazine didn’t find out until 1 December, just days from the December sitting.

We were alerted to the news by LSBF’s ACCA team. The college’s Paul Merison said: “I am delighted to see that ACCA has published the September 2016 exam papers and solutions for papers F5 through F9, presumably to show the new

exam structures on these papers match the specimen papers published earlier in the year.”

Although this would surely help students, he felt that publishing them only one week in advance of the December exam sitting meant that very few tutors or students would have had the chance to benefit, so it seemed a little odd that they were not published shortly after results in mid-October.

Merison suggested that the more past papers available to students the better, but equally he thought ACCA should have a cut-off date and not publish anything new less than two weeks before exam weeks.

New ACA alternatives

ICAEW is introducing an alternative financial reporting module for the Professional Level Financial Accounting and Reporting exam from March 2017. ACA students will be able to select a UK GAAP or an IFRS version of this exam, and study the financial reporting

framework to suit their work.

The learning materials will continue to cover the fundamental differences between UK GAAP and IFRS, so students will develop their knowledge of both frameworks.

Alternative modules offer a way of gaining in-depth understanding

give away to AAT, ACCA and CIMA readers – there are nine courses up for grabs. Go to page 23 to find out more.

their texts available this way. It believes not only will customers save money, but also time in reviewing entire books to find the one specific topic that they want to know more about.

across accountancy, finance and business, as well as subject and sector specific knowledge.

The ICAEW has said that your employer will help to guide you on which alternative to study. If you are studying the ACA independently you should consider your future ambitions when selecting which module to sit. For more details go to www.icaew.com/acaevolution

In brief FI keeps growing First Intuition is expanding again. New centres have opened in Southampton (right) and Scotland. The former has already commenced ICAEW courses and will be rolling out ACCA courses in the Spring of 2017. In Scotland, First Intuition is offering a combination of inclassroom and online live tuition in Aberdeen, Glasgow and Inverness.

To celebrate First Intuition’s Leeds first birthday we have courses to 8

Buy books by the chapter EWI’s ACCA and essential series material is now all available to buy by the chapter via the Amazon Kindle. EWI is the only ACCA material provider to make

Student sues university Former student Faiz Siddiqui is suing Oxford University for £1m, claiming its ‘appalling’ tuition ruined his chance of getting a firstclass degree. He left with a 2.1 and feels he lost out on a ‘stellar career’ as a commercial lawyer. Siddiqui

told the High Court that his failure to get a first had left him suffering depression and incapable of holding down a job. The university has admitted that with half the faculty staff on sabbatical there were some difficulties teaching his course (Asian history). However, its counsel wondered why it had taken Siddiqui 13 years to bring the case.

If he wins the fear for universities is it could open the floodgates to more complaints. We were awaiting a ruling by Justice Kerr as PQ magazine went to press.

PQ Magazine January 2017

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PQ news

PREM SIKKA Government proposals won’t check ‘fat cattery’ Corporate wealth is generated by the collective efforts of all stakeholders, but is disproportionately appropriated by a few. Despite the banking crash, executive pay has soared. In 1998, the ratio of average FTSE100 CEO pay to the average pay of full-time employees was 47:1. By 2015 this had increased to 128:1. With rising public disquiet the government has published a consultation on shackling executive pay. The main proposal is to have a binding annual shareholder vote on executive remuneration at major firms. This is bound to fail. With average shareholding duration at banks of less than three months, shareholders resemble speculators and traders. They are focused on short-term returns and have shown little interest in shackling fat-cattery.

The government mistakenly assumes that shareholders own large companies and are the main risktakers. Shareholders provide between 5% and 8% of the total capital of major banks. The remainder is provided by savers and other stakeholders. Banks have been bailed out by taxpayers. Employees have a long-term interest in the prosperity of banks. None of these stakeholders are given any rights.

Instead of putting workers and longterm stakeholders on boards to check executive excesses, the government has put faith in remuneration committees and non-execs (mostly the chums of directors) to check fatcattery. This has not worked in the past and will not work in the future. n Prem Sikka is professor of accountancy at the University of Essex

New gateway to the CGMA CIMA and CIPFA have agreed a new ‘CPFA to CGMA Top Up through the CIMA Gateway’.

This fast-track path allows qualiifed CIPFA members to enhance their qualification and gain full CIMA membership and the globally recognised Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA) designation.

The new route is open to both UK and international CIPFA members.

CIPFA members can benefit from

up to 14 exemptions with the new CIMA Gateway route. After passing the Gateway exam (also known as the Management Case Study exam) they can move on to the Strategic Case Study exam, bypassing the three Strategic level OTs. In addition, CIMA says CIPFA members will have access to a wide range of student benefits and study support through CIMA’s online student community CIMAconnect.

CIMA CEO Andrew Harding said:

Rob Whiteman “CIMA is excited about the growing collaboration with CIPFA. We are delighted to share our expertise and knowledge and to enable CIPFA members to gain our globallyrecognised qualification.”

CIPFA’s CEO, Rob Whiteman, said: “This landmark offering provides CIPFA members with a fantastic opportunity to build their management accounting skill set.”

Recruitment firm target for hackers

Top dogs: PQ magazine recently attended The Gower College Swansea’s Higher Education Graduation 2016 ceremony. The event took place in the Great Hall at Swansea University’s Bay campus. First up on were the AAT Level 4 students, swiftly followed by its ACCA level 7 PQs

Just wave a placard!

Kenyan finance graduate Rakiel Kaoka was desperate for a job. So desperate that she took to the streets of Nairobi holding a sign displaying her name, phone number and qualifications.

The 24 year old stood there for three days, but it was worth it.

Photos of her holding the placard

went viral and she now has a job (albeit a three-month internship) with the Youth Development Fund.

The fund’s CEO, Josiah Moriasi, said the YDF was moved by her plight and the courageous way she sought attention from potential employers. He explained: “We have organised a shortterm package – a threemonth internship – as we prepare to offer a long-term solution.”

Recruitment firm Michael Page has been hacked, resulting in the theft of the personal information of 710,000 applicants.

Michael Page apparently became aware of the problem on 31 October, when the recruiter sent an email to clients explaining “an unauthorised third party illegally gained online access” to sensitive information. It admitted that names, email addresses and passwords had all been accessed. The hackers may have gained access via a development server used for testing.

Along with its service provider Capgemini, Page immediately locked down its serves and secured all possible entry points.

One PQ who spoke to us said they had received the email from Page on the 11 November and felt they hadn’t received “any more spam than usual (yet).” Another reader said: “Dear hacker I’m available at short notice for accountancy positions in the north west area. Thanks in advance.”

In brief – awards Spirit of enterprise at LSBU London South Bank University is The Times’ Higher Education Entrepreneurial University of the Year 2016.

It beat of the likes of Aston and University of Central Lancashire to the title. What impressed the judges was the sheer number of students engaged in the entrepreneurial programme.

They felt LSBU had demonstrated how its 10

“vision was translated into actions” within the curriculums and “more widely across their local, national and international networks”. The university now has more than 1,000 employer partners, with one in five students being sponsored by employers.

ACCA-X wins again ACCA’s innovative online learning programme, ACCA-X, has won the Exporting Excellence in Education Provision Award. Now in its second year, ACCA-X is broadening access to learning, allowing more people than ever before to gain valuable financial literacy skills and prepare for

the ACCA qualification. The ACCA’s Alan Hatfield said: “This recognition from the Education Investor Awards confirms that ACCA-X is changing the landscape for online business and finance education.”

Best e-newsletter The AAT has won the award for Best Association E-Newsletter at this year’s UK Association Awards. The AAT saw off competition from four other shortlisted association e-newsletters to win the award.

Devised in 2015, AAT Weekly replaced all other email communications that were issued to student members.

PQ Magazine January 2017

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PQ news

CARL LYGO Will UK colleges turn to the Middle East?

I was in Doha, Qatar, recently for a conference on Transnational Education (TNE), hosted by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The six states of the GCC are Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The conference had significant input from the British Council, which promotes all aspects of British education overseas. With the pressure from the new UK government to reduce the number of international students coming to the UK (current rumours suggest a small number of elite universities will be the only ones who can sponsor students to study in the UK), there is a significant focus on establishing British education hubs overseas.

UAE and Saudi Arabia are both home to a large number of internal schools, with more than 750,000 students enrolled. The GCC is looking at significant student mobility growth potential in Iran and Egypt. Saudi Arabia and Iran have the highest participation rates in higher education (55% and 58% respectively). Iran has seen the fastest improvement in higher education participation rates (203% growth between 2004-2014, growth from 21.6% up to 66%).

However, the Middle East is experiencing significant unemployment, according to the World Bank – 54% of the working age population is unemployed, with an average of 28.7% youth unemployment. Brexit will certainly be causing many in UK education to look to establishing centres overseas. n Professor Carl Lygo is chief executive of BPP

Get on track with maths CIMA knows that good maths skills are an essential underpinning for both its Certificate in Business Accounting and professional qualification, so it is offering all CIMA students access to some free maths modules. It is hoping this will ensure that PQs are up to speed with their maths knowledge and understanding.

The free maths modules will be especially useful if you are a certificate student who will be transferred to the 2017 Certificate syllabus in January without having completed the C03 assessment under the 2011 syllabus structure.

The modules will also provide a

Meet the poet accountant

ACA PQ Chris RussellJones is not only the winner of the Howard Jones Prize. He also works in KPMG’s audit department in Cardiff and studied with BPP. What not many people know, however, is that RussellJones is also a poet. Here is his ‘Exam Success’...

By day four, dejected, ejected, broken, A snivelling wreck, my mind’s capability a mere token.

Into an interview with a KPMG trainer, Questioning whether accountancy was the career to take further?

It has been 3 years and 15 days, Since I embarked on this crazy foray, To launch myself, despite my middle age, On a new career path, to turn a new page.

Pure chance brought me a co-student, totally au fait With the intricacies of accounts, I was totally made.

The support of my wife, who stood by my side, Fed me and loved me, was there when I cried.

Suited and booted, hair temporarily tamed, Fresh faced and eager, ready for fame, KPMG offices, laptop and spreadsheets The rite of passage for each new intake of audit sheep.

The ACA opens doors, although they have to be stiff, The oil of drive and passion surely helps them to shift.

I was a lucky one, for as I progressed further, The easier I found each hurdle to conquer.

All going swimmingly, until the first class.

Accountancy, bookkeeping, double entry – now not so smart.

I’m a sociologist, so give me theories and essays.

Enough of these T-accounts; your debits and credits send me into a craze.

So it is with immense pride, and some surprise, That I stand here today, to receive this prestigious prize.

Top of the class for advanced level exams, My tutors at BPP will be proud of this man. © Chris Russell-Jones 2016

£4m fine for Deloitte Deloitte has been fined a record £4m by the FRC over its misconduct in the audit of Aero Inventory between 2006 and 2008. Along with partner John Clennett, the accountancy watchdog said the firm’s conduct had fallen short of the standards reasonably to be expected of a member firm and a member of the ICAEW. A tribunal imposed a severe reprimand and a fine of £4m for Deloitte and a severe reprimand and a fine of £150,000 for Clennett.

PM’s fury at leaked Brexit memo A memo from Deloitte that suggested there is no plan for Brexit and that 30,000 extra civil 12

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Access the free maths modules at https://connect.cimaglobal.com/ groups/certificate-level-2017/ resources (search for ‘maths modules’).

Did they not know the mettle of this rebel?

Show me a furnace and I’ll fashion you a kettle!

Albeit I would certainly not be here today If it weren’t for the support of a few angelic rays.

servants were needed to cope with the new workloads has been attacked by Prime Minster Theresa May. The Times newspaper claimed the memo had been prepared for Number 10, but after further digging Deloitte released a statement confirming the memo was “not commissioned by the Cabinet Office”. Instead, the memo by Keith Leslie was intended for an “internal audience”. Former work and pensions secretary Ian Duncan Smith said Deloitte should be stripped of its government contracts.

KPMG boss to step down KPMG’s UK boss, Simon Collins, has said he will step down in March after five years at the helm. Collins has told partners at the annual

conference that he plans to go for the top job and hopes to lead the global network. KPMG is to start looking for a replacement and expects to have someone in place by the end of March.

Soccer boosts Leicester finances It may be struggling to find a Premier League win this season but the success of Leicester City Football Club has boosted the local economy by over £140m in gross value added (GVA), supported over 2,500 jobs, and generated over £78m in tax revenues, a new EY study has found. The study estimates that visiting fans spent over £6.5m on local travel, accommodation, retail, and food and drink, stimulating additional economic activity and PQ Magazine January 2017

Your computer-based exams guidance and support

from March 2017, the AcA Professional and Advanced Level exams will start to move to computer.

Audit and Assurance and tax compliance will be the first to move to computer – here is your guidance and support to help you prepare for these exams.

exam guide – details what to expect on the day of your exam, how to navigate through the software and key functionality within the software.

series of short webinars – watch on-demand before your exam, these webinars provide an introduction to computer-based exams, an overview of the exam software and the exam experience from start to finish.

sample exams – access the computer-based exam software, so you can practise answering questions as you would in the actual exam. find these resources and more information on key dates, how to book your exams and access arrangements at icaew.com/cbe

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PQ annual quiz

ANNUAL BUMPER QUIZ SO WHAT DO YOU KNOW? Back by popular demand, here is our much-loved Annual Bumper Quiz. Thanks to our wonderful sponsors, the accountancy bodies, we are giving three readers the chance to win a fabulous iPhone watch

SPORT

1 2

Who won team GB’s first gold at the Rio games in the summer?

Sam Allardyce was briefly the England manager during 2016.

How many days was he in the job before he quit?

3

The last day of the 2016 county cricket season saw three teams vying for the championship title.

Name the three counties involved.

4 5 6 7

The curse of Billy and his pet goat has finally been broken.

But how?

Name the five ‘Uniteds’ that have won the FA Cup. Who won the 2016 Tour de France?

The European Champions Cup (Rugby Union) final in 2016 was held in Lyon. Who walked off with the trophy?

8 9 10

The US won the 41st Ryder Cup. But in what US state was this year’s competition held?

Which horse won the 2016 Grand National?

Who is the second GB boxer to win both a gold Olympic medal and a world title by a major professional sanctioning body (Jame DeGale was the first)?

IN THE NEWS

11

Britain’s new £200m polar research ship is now called RRS Sir David Attenbrough, but what did the public want to call it after a poll?

12 13 14 15 16

Which word did Collins Dictionary make its ‘word of the year’ for 2016?

How many sides will the new £1 coin have (it is being introduced in March 2017)?

The ‘Sellout’ won the Man Brooker Prize 2016. But who was the author?

Donald Trump won the US Presidential race in 2016, but name his vice president elect.

Prince Harry recently got all hot under the collar about press intrusion over his latest girlfriend, who stars in Suits. What’s her name?

17 18 19 20

Who played the killer accountant in the movie ‘The Accountant’?

‘His Royal Purpleness’ passed away this year. What was he better known as?

Who is Labour’s current shadow home secretary?

In India in November, which denomination banknotes were temporarily discontinued?

ENTERTAINMENT

21 22 23

Who was Glamour magazine’s ‘Women of the Year’ in 2016?

2016?

Who was robbed in Paris of $8m worth of jewels in Who has run off with ‘Bake-Off’ to Channel 4?

24

The winner of Eurovision in 2016 sang about the deportation of Tatars under Joseph Stalin. What country were they from?

25

Which former band, who won Eurovision in Brighton, have promised a reunion, be it only virtually?

26

Who was the first celebrity dancer controversially voted out of 2016’s Strictly Come Dancing?

27

Which EastEnders star was recently told he was a direct descendent from William the Bastard?

28 29

Who plays Prince Philip in Netflix’s blockbuster TV show ‘The Crown’?

Which BBC host presenter had to give the keys back of a revamped TV show in July, saying “I gave it my best shot”?

30

He has been much talked about as the next OO7, but who appeared in Star Trek Beyond as the main antagonist Krall?

GEOGRAPHY

31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38

In which mountain range is Ben Nevis?

Into which fountain should you throw a coin to ensure you will return to Rome?

Boko Haram is an Islamic extremist group based in which African country?

Clifford’s Tower is a wellknown landmark in which English northern city?

What is the longest river in Canada?

Which capital city has a population of nearly 40m?

Which country tried to invade Canada in 1812?

The Battle of Hastings didn’t actually take place in Hastings, East Sussex. Where did King Harold die?

39 40 41 plates?

Which country was the first to introduce car number What is the world’s fourth most populated country?

SCIENCE & NATURE What theory was first advanced by Georges Lemaitre? It is now the name of one of the biggest US TV shows staring flat-sharing academics.

42

Russia and the US were the first two counties to put a man in space. Who was the third country?

43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

Just two planets in our solar system do not have any moons. Name one of them.

How many stomachs does a cow have?

Which gas is produced by lightning during thunderstorms?

Which bird is regarded as the fastest in the air when diving towards prey?

What is the name of the aircraft used by the Red Arrows in their displays?

What kind of creature is a dik-dik?

How many time zones does China have?

How much large than the earth is the sun? (a) 100,000 (b) 300,000 (c) 500,000

Send your answers to:

The Editor, PQ Magazine, Unit 3, Kingfisher Heights, Bramwell Way, Royal Docks, London E16 2GQ. Or email them – putting ‘Quiz’ in the subject header – to graham@pqaccountant.com.

The closing date is Monday 16 January 2017.

Thanks to our sponsors – the accountancy bodies

14

PQ Magazine January 2017

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PQ Awards 2017

THE CATEGORIES n PQ OF THE YEAR n NQ OF THE YEAR n DISTANCE LEARNING STUDENT n ACCOUNTANCY APPRENTICE n STUDENT BODY OF THE YEAR n ACCOUNTANCY BODY n ACCOUNTANCY COLLEGE – PUBLIC SECTOR n ACCOUNTANCY COLLEGE – PRIVATE SECTOR n ONLINE COLLEGE n LECTURER – PUBLIC SECTOR n LECTURER – PRIVATE SECTOR n STUDY RESOURCE n INNOVATION IN ACCOUNTANCY n BEST USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA n TRAINING MANAGER / MENTOR n ACCOUNTANCY TEAM n ACCOUNTANCY PERSONALITY n EDITOR’S SPECIAL AWARD

Stand out from the crowd

Time is tight – so come on, get your entry in for the PQ awards! The closing date is now 9 January

T

he deadline for the 2017 PQ magazine awards has been extended to Monday 9 January, so you still have time to get nominating!

Our lush venue, Café de Paris, has been booked, as have our judges. Even the red carpet is being cleaned ready for the top accountancy awards night around.

The event will take place on 21 February, so you need to add that to your calendar. But before you do that there is the little matter of 250 words, which needs to be with us by the new deadline date (that’s Monday 9 January).

We are more than happy that you nominate yourself for any of the awards – there are 17 categories in all. And we promise to give you a night to remember if you are shortlisted.

Just go to www.pqmagazine.com and click on the ‘pq awards’ bar and download the form. Or you can just email your 250 wise words direct to us at awards@pqmagazine.com. If you do that just make sure we know which category you are entering, and we will make sure your entry is seen by our independent judges. Last year the judges looked at every entry before even deciding on the shortlist and eventual winners.

Please note that our address has changed.

You now need to send your postal entries to: The Editor, PQ magazine, Unit 3, Kingfisher Heights, 2 Bramwell Way, Royal Docks, London E16 2GQ. So come on guys and girls, get those entries in before Christmas, and we could be sending you a nice little invite to cheer you up on a dreary January morn! PQ

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16

PQ Magazine January 2017

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PQ ACCA project

SEEKING PERFECTION Faye Chua explains how you can become the perfect professional accountant

N

o one can afford to ignore the fact that the world is changing.

More than ever those looking to become financial analysts, economists, lawyers or indeed accountants need to ensure they have the right skills to meet the complex needs of prospective employers, their clients and the world of business.

We continue to see global business regularly changing with technology, ongoing globalisation and the evolution of governance models playing an important role in this new landscape. Against this backdrop, professional accountants need to make sure they are not only highly skilled in technical areas but that they have vision and a strategic mind-set.

ACCA’s executive director of strategy and development, Alan Hatfield, wrote in PQ magazine’s November issue about an in-depth global research project from ACCA involving input from 2,000 business and finance professionals around the world. The project, called ‘Professional accountants – the future’, showed that an optimum blend of skills, experience and intelligence is now needed by professional accountants.

ACCA’s ‘Professional accountants – the future’ is a project which is close to my heart. My team and I have worked on it for the past two years, and in doing so we identified that to add value for their employers and clients the professional accountants of the future will need an optimal and changing combination of professional competencies. A collection of technical knowledge, skills and abilities, combined with interpersonal behaviours and qualities. ACCA has called these ‘professional quotients’. By 2020, all professional accountants will need to develop and balance the components of these professional quotients to fit their role and stage of career if they are to keep pace with the demands of their employers.

18

• Faye Chua is Head of Business Insights at ACCA

Technical knowledge, skills and abilities and a strong ethical compass – the professional accountant’s technical and ethical quotient (TEQ) will remain the core quality underpinning their success. It is technical expertise and the integrity with which it is applied that makes a professional accountant unique.

Students studying accountancy today need to be trained to the highest professional standards, looking beyond the numbers and with a global mind-set.

To define what the finance professional of the future must look like, ACCA has developed a set of seven professional quotients – a mix of technical knowledge, skills and abilities formed with interpersonal behaviours and qualities.

Technical and ethical competencies (TEQ): the skills and abilities to perform activities consistently to a defined standard. Often based on a professional qualification.

Intelligence (IQ): the ability to acquire and use knowledge: thinking, reasoning, and solving problems.

Creativity (CQ): the ability to use existing knowledge in a new situation, to make

connections, explore potential outcomes and generate new ideas.

Digital quotient (DQ): the awareness and application of existing and emerging digital technologies, capabilities, practices, strategies and culture.

Emotional intelligence (EQ): the ability to identify your own emotions and those of others, harness and apply them to tasks, and regulate and manage them.

Vision (VQ): the ability to predict future trends accurately by extrapolating existing trends and facts, and filling the gaps by thinking innovatively.

Experience (XQ): the ability and skills to understand customer expectations, meet desired outcomes and create value.

In a rapidly changing world, professional accountants must continue to promote good governance, facilitate sustainable access to finance for business, and apply the highest professional and ethical standards in their work.

Having the right qualities will be crucial to being successful. In order to be able to deal with forces such as volatility and uncertainty now part of our day to day world, these technical and ethical competencies will play a key role to making a well-rounded finance professional.

As the world changes, more responsibility will be placed on the accountancy profession. We cannot afford to sit back. We must meet the challenges of the future. ACCA’s innovations set a new standard, fully integrating deep, broad and relevant technical expertise with ethics and professional skills.

As a diverse group of individuals, what ties us together is the profession we love and work so hard to be a part of. We know accountants will continue to be at the heart of whatever happens in the years ahead.

ACCA’s research shows that by embracing these characteristics we will not only have the edge within the profession, but we will be called upon to demonstrate the leadership that will be needed. PQ

PQ Magazine January 2017

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Your CIMA studies should fit around you, not your training provider.

Learning that’s built around you. It’s a simple statement but one that’s becoming more important in a world where time is precious and life’s ‘to do’ list only ever seems to get bigger. We all work harder than ever before, so finding time to study shouldn’t be hard too.

We’ve listened to feedback from students like you, to make major improvements to all of our CIMA courses, so they better match the way you sit on-demand exams.

The result – a promise that no matter which study method you choose, you’ll have the confidence, flexibility and support to pass your exams. It’s learning that’s built around you.

Instant tutor response

Everything in one course

“I want help quickly so I can resolve issues while they’re fresh in my mind.”

“It’s reassuring to know I have all of the resources I’ll need so I don’t need to worry about having to buy anything extra.”

Fitting in time to study can be hard, so you want it to be as productive as possible. If you get stuck, our tutors are available to contact instantly via Live Chat, or you can email us or request a callback. We’re staying open longer too with tutors available for all CIMA students on evenings and weekends.

More practice questions “I learn best from doing lots of practice questions and I like knowing there are lots of resources available to learn from.”

Practice, practice, practice. Almost everyone we spoke to said they prepared for exams using question practice.

You’ll have access to hundreds of questions per subject.

Work through them all or create your own tests to target certain areas. And finish your preparation with up to 4 marked mock exams. You’ll get personalised feedback showing the questions you got right and wrong, with explanations for each answer.

Efficient structured approach “It would really help me to have someone who can steer me in the right direction so I can use my time to study effectively” Rather than just giving you lots of extra materials, we will recommend the most effective ways to use them and how best to navigate through the syllabus. This means you can focus your study time efficiently and ensure you’ve covered off everything you need before you sit the exam.

Go into the exam feeling confident, knowing your complete course contains everything you need to pass.

Work through tuition, revision and question practice with a range of online resources covering 100% of the syllabus.

You’ll also receive printed official CIMA study materials – the only materials reviewed and approved by CIMA.

Proactive tutor support “I’d like regular contact with my tutor so I know if I’m starting to fall behind.”

Need some extra motivation? You can request proactive tutor support at no extra cost. We’ll make regular contact with you to keep you on track and check you’re progressing at a rate you’re comfortable with.

More regular start dates “I’d like to have more course start dates to help me plan my time better.”

Don’t wait 3 months for the next timetabled class to start.

We’re putting on more Classroom and Live Online start dates, so you’ll never have to wait more than a few weeks to start a tutor-led course.

If you choose OnDemand you can choose to start whenever suits your schedule whilst still having the confidence of a structured, efficient programme to work through.

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CIMA CIMA exams PQ

Changes to Cert BA Shane Balzan explains the changes to CIMA’s Certificate in Business Accounting syllabus

have less focus on contract and case law and more on ethics, ethical dilemmas and corporate governance.

xam booking is now available for the revised Certificate in Business Accounting 2017 syllabus. The earliest date students can sit the exam is 11 January 2017. The current syllabus will still be assessed until 10 January 2017.

Why we decided to update the syllabus The Cert BA is designed to elevate people and businesses to success by developing skills and unlocking talent. It can be a standalone qualification designed to provide a solid grasp of the fundamentals of business or provide an entry route to the professional qualification.

With the help of 10 industry roundtable discussions conducted in eight countries with 90 organisations we were able to identify practical competencies required by junior finance staff and equivalent roles across business. Employers want junior finance professionals to have the ability to separate relevant information from nonrelevant information.

They also expect them to be able to form opinions, provide managers with feedback and to be able to communicate effectively across the business.

Therefore, it is important that the practical application of the theory we teach can be assessed.

In addition, we conducted five

E

What is new about the 2017 Cert BA? We regularly review our qualifications to ensure they remain relevant and appropriate in terms of structure, content and assessment. Regarding structure, we are moving to four subjects instead of the current five.

The topics that are currently in the C03 Foundations of Business Mathematics have now been integrated into three Certificate Qualification subjects (BA1 Fundamentals of Business Economics, BA2 Fundamentals of Management Accounting and BA3 Fundamentals of Financial Accounting). In addition, we have updated the content of these as well as of the further subject, BA4 Fundamentals of Ethics, Corporate Governance and Business Law. This will

Balzan: ‘qualification regularly reviewed’ educational roundtables across five countries to review existing syllabus content and to make sure CIMA students are prepared as best as possible.

The new study materials for Cert BA, including exam and question tutorials, are already available and we wish all our students the best of luck for their exams. PQ • Shane Balzan, Head of Syllabus Development, Education Directorate, CIMA

giveaways PQ

First Intuition Leeds are a year old this month and to celebrate they are offering some fantastic FREE courses.

There is something for everyone here!

What a year it’s been for FI Leeds! Since opening in December 2015 the college couldn’t have wished for a better start, according to MD Lucy Parr. She said: “We have been receiving fantastic feedback from students who love our teaching, our customer service and our facilities, with 100% of our students saying they would recommend us.

“Our pass rates are above the national average and include a CIMA student who achieved top PQ Magazine January 2017

GREAT LEEDS

GIVEAWAY

marks of 150/150 on his exam!” She added: “Contact us to get information on our CIMA, ACCA, AAT and ICAEW courses, and come and see what a difference we can make to your studies and studying experience.”

So what is up for grabs? FI Leeds is offering: • three CIMA Operational tuition courses.

• three ACCA fundamentals classroom tuition courses.

• three AAT level 2 or level 3 classroom tuition courses.

To enter this giveaway email

• PQ magazine’s usual terms and conditions apply

graham@pqaccountant.com with you name, contact number and the course you want to attend. Put ‘FI Leeds’ in the subject header of your email – and it really is as that simple.

Deadline for entries is Monday 16 January 2017. PQ 23

PQ PQ survey

State of study survey

PQ magazine has joined forces with Hays to discover if employers are treating you right when it comes to study packages and exams. We need you to go online and answer our short survey

Participate in our survey and you could win in a

Kindle Fire

W

ay back in 2012, PQ magazine and Hays Accoutancy & Finance ran a survey about the study support PQs received, and we both thought it was time to revisit this subject to see how much the world has changed.

We don’t want to pre-empt anything about your world now, but back in 2012 our conclusion was that employers needed to do more to support their PQs. Some 42% of PQ readers said their employers were not supportive enough.

Several respondents said they just wanted the boss to care a bit more and “ask how it was going once in a while”.

As one PQ said: “I just want them to seem interested. I don’t get asked questions about my studying, it feels like they are not interested.”

Go to http://feedback.hays.com/f/1089278/1848/ to complete our survey

A QUICK LOOK AT...

Working capital is the net investment by a company in current assets minus current liabilities. In common with all forms of capital, working capital has a cost and should, therefore, be minimised. On the other hand, a shortage of working capital imposes different types of costs on a business (e.g. sales foregone due to inadequate inventory holdings).

Analysing an entity’s working capital position is, therefore, an exercise in evaluating how well a business is balancing these competing constraints.

It is accepted that there are reasonably wellrecognised benchmarks against which the working capital level of a business can be compared. Typical examples of such benchmarks would assert that the ‘working 24

Our survey found that just over half of all employers pay for their PQs’ tuition fees in full, with a further 13% paying for them in part. But that left over one in three (37%) funding their own study.

There are similar percentages for exam fees and study material.

For those who got employer support the average PQ was given 2.82 days study leave per exam.

The big changes to this year’s survey are our questions about online exams.

We want to know if you are ready for what lies ahead.

We also asked about PQs’ job expectations. Around 50% of you said you expected to move jobs in the next six months. So how confident are PQs now about moving while studying? We know that can be a hard decision. But if you aren’t being supported then surely that decision becomes easier.

So come on, get online and tell us what you expect from your employer when it comes to the ideal study package. All respondents will also be in with a chance to win a 7” Amazon Kindle Fire – your name will go into our prize draw. A great stocking filler! PQ • See page 26 for our salary checker We need you to go online to take our survey – go to http://feedback. hays.com/f/1089278/1848/

analysing working capital

capital ratio’ (i.e. the ratio of current assets to current liabilities) should be around 2:1 and the so-called ‘quick ratio’ (essentially current assets minus inventories to current liabilities) should be around 1:1.

However, it is extremely important to note that these traditional benchmarks work best for traditional businesses such as manufacturing and certain types of retailing, and may be irrelevant for other types, such as firms in the business of construction or land development, or large-scale food retailers. Firms in the latter category would, for instance, be expected to operate with considerable negative working capital. This is because they would usually turn over their inventory very quickly, pay their trade payables (creditors) quite slowly and receive all

of their revenue in cash.

Over-trading occurs when a company grows too quickly and has insufficient capital to support the expansion. This will typically manifest itself in ever-increasing inventory and receivables balances partly offset by increasing trade payables (due, mostly, to an inability to pay on time). It will also probably feature a ballooning bank overdraft. This can, in an extreme case, be fatal to even an inherently profitable business. The only real remedy is an injection of long-term capital into the business.

• Gerard Long is an AIA Achieve e-tutor. The AIA Achieve team is producing a series of ‘A Quick Look at….’ articles and more can be found on the AIA website: www.aiaworldwide.com/a-quick-look-at.

PQ Magazine January 2017

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Accounting & Tax We go together like...

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Find out more about the benefits of the CTA and to register as a CTA student visit:

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PQ salary survey

What are you worth?

Karen Young provides her insight into the newly released Hays UK Salary & Recruiting Trends 2017 guide.

T

he outcomes of the political events of 2016 are a long way from being fully realised, but the continued demand for talented PQs is a near certainty for the year ahead. There has perhaps never been a better time to be a PQ. Considerable demand for PQs from all sectors outstrips supply, giving employees the confidence to move roles and encouraging employers to increase salaries.

If you are one of the many PQs looking to move this year I recommend you become fully aware of the many options available to you. Arm yourself with an understanding of the different job roles, working environments and sectors available to you so you can target your job search effectively. You continue to tell us that career development is one of your top priorities when considering your next role. Though it is crucial employers focus on supporting employees with their development, the onus is also on you to make sure that you prioritise your own long-term development. When interviewing, make sure you enquire about opportunities for progression as this will demonstrate your keenness to learn and build a career with the company.

Findings from the Hays UK Salary & Recruiting Trends 2017 guide • Salaries for PQs increased by an average 2% in the past 12 months. This increase is higher than the 1.4% salary increase those working in accountancy and finance received overall.

• 21% of finance employers plan to increase salaries by 2.5% or above in the year ahead – the intention to raise pay is unchanged post the EU referendum.

• Over half (58%) of PQs are not satisfied with their salary.

• Over two-thirds (68%) of PQs had not asked for a pay rise in the past year.

• Following the EU referendum, 64% of employees working across accountancy and finance said they anticipate moving in the next 12 months, 46% in the next six months.

• Over half (56%) of PQs rated their work-life balance as ‘very good’ or ‘good’.

• Nearly all (97%) PQs feel they have the skills necessary to their current role.

• The top benefits for PQs when considering a new role are flexible working (67%), over 25 days annual leave (56%), and financial support for professional studies (55%).

• Following the referendum only 7% of finance employers are anticipating a decrease in business activity.

• Skill shortages continue in accountancy and finance – 23% of employers felt their organisations did not have the talent needed to achieve their objectives.

• Over two-fifths, (41%) of accountancy and finance employers expect to face applicants with unrealistic salary expectations this year.

• The three most common benefits offered by employers in accountancy and finance are childcare vouchers (70%), an above statutory contributory pension (63%), and financial support for professional studies (61%). PQ ABOUT HAYS UK SALARY & RECRUITING TRENDS 2017 The salary data has been compiled using information gathered during 2016 from the 96 Hays offices across the UK. It is based on job listings, job offers and candidate registrations. The recruiting trends and benefits data is based on the responses of over 450 part qualified accountants and around 1,600 finance employers. A separate ‘pulse’ survey of over 200 finance employers and 200 part qualified accountants was carried out in September 2016, after the EU referendum. For further information visit www.hays.co.uk/salary-guide 26

Scotland AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £18,000-£23,000 £23,000-£28,500 £28,000-£35,000 £25,000-£32,000 £28,500-£35,000 £18,500-£24,000 £27,000-£35,000 £24,000-£30,000 £27,000-£33,000

Typical £20,500 £27,000 £32,000 £28,000 £32,000 £22,000 £30,000 £25,000 £28,000

Salary range £16,000-£25,000 £25,000-£30,000 £30,000-£35,000 £25,000-£32,000 £30,000-£35,000 £22,000-£26,000 £26,000-£30,000 £19,000-£23,000 £24,000-£27,000

Typical £21,500 £28,000 £30,000 £27,000 £30,000 £25,000 £28,000 £21,000 £27,000

Salary range £18,000-£24,000 £22,000-£28,000 £26,000-£32,000 £25,000-£34,000 £33,000-£40,000 £20,000-£27,000 £23,000-£30,000 £22,000-£27,000 £26,000-£30,000

Typical £22,000 £25,000 £30,000 £29,000 £35,000 £24,000 £27,000 £25,000 £29,500

Salary range £16,000-£25,000 £24,000-£32,000 £28,000-£37,000 £24,000-£34,000 £28,000-£37,000 £24,000-£30,000 £28,000-£35,000 £24,000-£32,000 £28,000-£35,000

Typical £23,000 £28,500 £33,000 £30,000 £33,000 £25,000 £30,000 £27,000 £30,000

North West AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

West Midlands AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

South West AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

PQ Magazine January 2017

salary survey PQ

North East AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £15,000-£19,000 £23,000-£30,000 £28,000-£35,000 £23,000-£30,000 £28,000-£35,000 £20,000-£28,000 £28,000-£35,000 £22,000-£27,000 £25,000-£33,000

Typical £18,000 £26,000 £30,000 £26,000 £30,000 £24,000 £31,000 £26,000 £30,000

Yorkshire & the Humber AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £16,000-£21,000 £22,000-£27,500 £27,500-£34,500 £21,000-£28,000 £28,000-£40,000 £22,000-£26,500 £27,500-£33,500 £20,000-£26,500 £25,000-£28,500

Typical £18,000 £25,000 £30,500 £25,000 £31,000 £24,500 £29,000 £24,500 £27,500

East Midlands AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £18,000-£24,000 £22,000-£28,000 £26,000-£33,000 £25,000-£30,000 £28,000-£36,000 £20,000-£27,000 £23,000-£30,000 £24,000-£30,000 £26,000-£32,000

Typical £21,000 £25,000 £31,000 £27,000 £32,000 £24,000 £27,000 £27,000 £30,000

East of England AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £18,000-£24,000 £23,500-£29,000 £29,000-£36,500 £23,500-£29,000 £29,000-£36,500 £21,000-£30,000 £24,000-£38,000 £23,500-£29,000 £29,000-£36,500

Typical £21,000 £26,500 £32,500 £26,500 £32,500 £26,000 £32,500 £25,000 £32,500

London AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist

Salary range £23,000-£27,000 £28,000-£35,000 £37,000-£44,000 £28,000-£36,000 £37,000-£45,000 £23,000-£30,000 £28,000-£36,500 £28,000-£34,500 £30,000-£38,000

Typical £25,000 £34,000 £40,000 £35,000 £42,000 £28,000 £33,000 £33,500 £38,000

South East AAT Studier ACCA PQ ACCA Finalist CIMA PQ CIMA Finalist CIPFA PQ CIPFA Finalist ACA PQ ACA Finalist PQ Magazine January 2017

Salary range £18,000-£27,000 £30,000-£36,000 £35,000-£45,000 £30,000-£36,000 £38,000-£45,000 £24,000-£30,000 £28,000-£35,000 £24,000-£30,000 £28,000-£32,000

Typical £24,000 £34,000 £40,000 £35,000 £42,000 £28,000 £33,000 £28,000 £31,000 27

PQ CIPFA spotlight

Time for gender equality Gillian Fawcett explains why CIPFA is setting up a Women in Public Finance Network to explore gender equality in public services

D

espite nearly 40 years of government action on gender equality issues, there are still invisible and visible barriers that impede the career progress of women working in finance in the public sector.

Research from EY shows that although women occupy a wealth of positions within public services, only 36.2% hold leadership positions in the UK. However, in comparison to other countries, the UK has one of the best records for hiring women into top positions. For example, in Germany women occupy only 18% of public sector senior positions. Yet the statistics from EY demonstrate that women still encounter significant difficulties in being promoted to the very top posts.

The reasons behind this glass ceiling will be complex, but research from the

Civil Service shines a light on some of the issues behind the gender imbalance.

According to the Civil Service, one of the main, and well-documented, challenges

is that women often have greater care responsibilities in comparison to their male counterparts.

This often leads to more women working part time, where they then have less opportunities to network and receive development training.

Other significant issues were identified, such as women often underestimating their ability to carry out senior roles.

Although there has been action taken to address these issues, such as flexible working, shared maternity leave and quotas, unconscious biases remain.

These can often be deeply ingrained, but considering there has been a significant shift in attitudes over the past 60 years, there is great hope things will improve even further.

In the coming months, CIPFA will be setting up a Women in Public Finance Network to explore these issues and provide support to its students and members. PQ readers who want to learn more about the new network can contact customerservices@cipfa.org. PQ • Gillian Fawcett, CIPFA’s Head of Governments Faculty

New CIPFA part qualifieds for Northern Ireland

T

w

his year has seen CIPFA’s new accountancy trainee scheme in Northern Ireland get off to a flying start. Since launching the scheme in May, the public finance accountancy specialist has recruited and employed a number of accountancy trainees, placing them with CIPFA’s partner employers within a range of public sector organisations, such as health trusts and local councils.

During the three-year programme, trainees will gain valuable experience and study the CIPFA professional qualification.

The scheme provides an innovative approach to recruiting and nurturing the next generation of finance professionals while providing a flexible, cost-effective solution for public sector organisations in Northern Ireland – fulfilling the need for continuity of resources without adding to headcount numbers for the organisations who have joined the programme.

More information on the CIPFA’s Northern Ireland Accountancy Trainee Scheme is available at customerservices@cipfa.org. PQ

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PQ Magazine January 2017

AAT exams PQ

LET’S GET TECHNICAL

Are you ready to sit AAT Level 2 Bookkeeping Transactions (AQ2016), asks Gareth John

I

f you kicked off your level 2 AAT studies in the last two or three months you may well have started with the Bookkeeping Transactions (BTRN) unit. This is a great place to start your AAT journey as the syllabus covers a wide range of fundamental concepts and principles that are important foundations in a career in accountancy.

Sometimes students who have not sat an AAT assessment before get nervous about whether they are ready to sit their first exam. This is based on a natural fear of failing, but it is important to understand the importance of building momentum to progress through the qualification at a good pace.

There is a fine balance between making sure that you have done enough work to achieve competence, but not delaying so much that you start to forget most of what you have learned. If you have attempted a couple of sample assessments and achieved competence that is a great indication that you are ready for the real thing, and should delay no further. Just do it!

Here is a short quiz picking out some of the technical areas dealt with in each of the 10 tasks you will face. Once you have had a go at it you can watch me go through my answers at www.firstintuition.co.uk/category/aat/ Health warning: this quiz does not cover every aspect of the BTRN assessment and the tasks here are not laid out in the same style for reasons of space. Make sure you have a go at the sample assessments on the AAT website as these give a good idea of what to expect.

Task 1 It is 30 June and a business has just received a cheque from a credit customer, A Ltd, for £1,900 in full settlement of their outstanding account balance. Here is the account for A Ltd in the sales ledger of the business: Date 01 June 15 June 21 June

Details Bal b/d Sales invoice 245 Sales invoice 273

Amount £ 4,500 2,300 3,500

Date 5 June 13 June 20 June

Details Credit note 26 Bank Credit note 32

Amount £ 300 4,200 400

Is the cheque for £1,900 an overpayment or an underpayment?

Which transaction does the discrepancy appear to relate to?

Task 2 A business has received two credit notes from suppliers for the last period: one from B Ltd for £100 (net) and one from C Ltd for £240 (gross).

What entry needs to be made in the purchase ledger account of B Ltd? Account name

Amount £

Debit/Credit

Enter these two purchase credit notes into the purchases returns day book.

Date 1 July 1 July

Details B Ltd C Ltd

Credit Note number 9983 C1726

Total £

VAT £

Task 4 A business has made a cash payment to E Ltd of £360 for cash purchases that included VAT, and a cheque payment for £350 to F Ltd. Enter these transactions onto the credit side of the cash book and total each column.

Cash book credit side Cash £

Bal b/d

Total

PQ Magazine January 2017

Bank £ 1,000

VAT £

Purchases ledger £

Task 6 A cus tomer called G Ltd has bought 10 units of a product that has a net list price of £50. The customer receives a 10% trade discount. Another customer called H Ltd has purchased goods worth a gross value of £720.

The VAT rate is 20%.

How would these two sales invoice be entered into the sales day book?

Date 1 Aug 1 Aug

Details G Ltd H Ltd

Invoice number 25646 25647

Total £

VAT £

Net £

What will be the entries in the subsidiary ledger?

Account name

Amount £

Debit/Credit

What will be the entries in the main ledger?

Account name

Amount £

Debit/Credit

Task 7 The totals on the credit side of the cash book are shown below.

Details

Cash £

Bank £

VAT £

Total

2,400

9,600

400

Trade payables £ 9,600

Cash Office purchases £ expenses £ 1,500

500

If the cash book is not part of the double entry bookkeeping system what will be the double entry posted to the main ledger?

Task 8 Complete the ledger account shown below and identify what the balance brought down on 1 September would be.

Sales ledger control account Date 1 August 15 August

Details Bal b/d Sales Total

Amount £ 43,290 32,476

Date 18 August

Details Bank

Amount £ 28,546

Total

Net £

Task 3 D Ltd purchases goods from another VAT registered supplier with a list price of £275 (excluding VAT). A trade discount of 10% is given with a further 2% discount if the invoice is paid within 14 days. D Ltd has a policy of not taking up any prompt payment discounts if offered. The VAT rate is 20%. How much will D Ltd pay the supplier?

Details

Task 5 A business has set the Imprest level at £150 and at the start of July the petty cash box was replenished to this level. During July the business paid for two amounts out of petty cash; £45 (net) for repairs to a salesman’s car and £36 (gross) for stationery. When the petty cash box is replenished at the start of August how much will need to be withdrawn from the bank?

Cash purchases £

Task 9 Which side if the trial balance will the following ledger account balances appear on? a) Sales b) Purchases c) Motor vehicles d) Motor expenses e) Sales returns f) Purchases returns g) Discounts allowed h) Discounts received Task 10 If the total value of assets of a business is £65,000 and the total value of capital is £20,000, what is the total value of liabilities? PQ • Gareth John is a tutor/director with First Intuition and helps to manage their AAT distance learning programme. He was PQ Magazine Accountancy Lecturer of the Year in 2011 29

PQ ICAEW spotlight

Get ready for the CBEs Next spring, ICAEW will be introducing new ACA computerbased exams. Here we explain what it will entail

overview of what to expect on the day of your exam.

The response area

F

rom March 2017, ICAEW will start to move the ACA Professional and Advanced Level exams to computer. Audit and Assurance and Tax Compliance will be the first exams to move to computer at this time.

If you’re studying the ACA you will continue to study, practise questions and prepare for computer-based exams as you do currently for ACA exams, although it is recommended that you become familiar with the new computer-based exam software in advance of your exams.

Enhancing the exam experience Integrating technology into the exams will enhance the exam experience, by making it more reflective of your everyday work environment.

Technology plays a large part in the workplace and it’s likely that you’re using technology to write reports, create spreadsheets, tables and undertake computations. The new computerbased exam platform will reflect these activities that you’re already undertaking as part of your ACA training.

So what will the exam software look like? The exam questions will look exactly the same as the paper version. You will see the questions on screen and input your answers using a computer.

The syllabus, exam structure and format of the questions are not changing. Here, we show you screen shots of the software to give you an

The response area is where you’ll add your answers to each exam requirement. It has all the essential functions you need during an exam – you will already be familiar with most of these functions. Within the response area, you can also add narrative and numeric responses to an exam question.

Annotate the exam requirement During the exam you can view the exam question and the response area, side-by-side. You can also highlight the question, add sticky notes and copy and paste text and numbers to the response area.

Guidance and support To help you become familiar with the new computer-based exam platform in advance of your exam, the following support and guidance is available: • A series of short webinars that focus on introducing computer-based exams, the ICAEW exam software and the exam experience from

start to finish.

• A computer-based exam guide providing detail on what to expect on the day of the exam, how to navigate through the software, key functionality within the software and frequently asked questions.

• Practice software.

Key dates Computer-based exams, at the ACA Professional and Advanced Levels, will be introduced over a two-year period. Be sure to make a note of the dates, so you know when each exam will move to computer.

• March 2017: Professional Level Tax Compliance and Audit and Assurance.

• September 2017: Professional Level Financial Accounting and Reporting and Financial Management.

• March 2018: Professional Level Business Planning and Business Strategy.

• November 2018: Advanced Level exams.

Find out more Access the new computer-based exams guidance and support and find out more on access arrangements and how to book your exam, visit icaew.com/cbe PQ

PQ healthcare

Are the foundations flawed?

Can the NHS’s transformations plans work? Some FDs have serious doubts

T

he foundations and frameworks of the sustainability and transformation plans (STPs) introduced to transform services and help re-balance NHS finances may be fundamentally flawed, according to finance directors working in the service.

In the latest NHS Financial Temperature Check from the Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA), most finance directors see STPs as a cornerstone of reducing the deficit – but an overwhelming majority also voiced concerns about the way they are set up, with nearly three-quarters (72%) concerned about their governance.

It appears finance directors have limited confidence in the simultaneous delivery of both STP and organisational financial objectives – with only 6% of trust finance directors and 17% of CCG

30

chief finance officers (CFOs) believing that they are both deliverable.

Across STP footprints, emergency care demand, social care budgets and an increasing demand on services are the biggest threats to a financial balance.

Worryingly, only 54% of finance directors believe that risks associated with STPs have been recognised, and just 5% believe adequate risk management arrangements are currently in place.

Paul Briddock, Director of Policy at HFMA, said: “Although STPs were met with enthusiasm and positivity when they were introduced, there is scepticism from FDs that the STP frameworks can work in practice. It is encouraging to see reported improvements in collaboration and some strong leadership in place, but when operating in a ‘club versus country’ framework, where there are conflicting priorities between individual organisations and footprint areas, the lack of clear governance is causing some angst.”

This rings true, as 62% of NHS finance directors say they will still prioritise their organisational objectives rather than their STP objectives. On reflection, 82% of finance directors believe that the regulatory regime needs to change to support the delivery of STPs, and 79% believe the financial regime needs to change, too. PQ PQ Magazine January 2017

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“Crystal and I went to the Learning and Technology show, there just wasn’t anything which could do what Rogo does in terms of testing.”

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“Our Rogo tests are going very well, they are proving to be a great benefit to our students for exam preparation.”

Gill Tucker Head of Qualifications, Training Link

Find out more – visit getrogo.com or call 0207 997 6755

PQ CIMA students

Work, rest and play…

Meet two CIMA students who have managed to achieve that all-too-elusive work-life balance

S

leepless nights or blissful dreams, solitude or time to party? While studying for your CIMA qualification cannot be compared to life at uni it doesn’t mean that you have to lock yourself away until you passed all the exams.

Two CIMA students – Richard Wood (27), who works as a consultant for Quantiq, and Charlotte Hyde (25), who works for Virgin Media – recently gave an insight into their lives on CIMA’s Instagram channels. Richard took over the mycimalife Instagram account to show what the life of a CIMA student looks like. Charlotte shared her story on CIMA’s global Instagram account after having been chosen via Virgin Media’s grad scheme for this. Richard and Charlotte are working full-time so balancing work, study and leisure can be tricky. Both have support from their employers who grant them study leave and days off for their exams.

While Richard has support from fellow accountants at work, Charlotte has a financial incentive linked to each CIMA level she passes.

Richard is currently doing project work for

32

which he has to do a lot of commuting. He spends around 10 hours per week studying but has an exam coming up soon. This means he will probably have to dedicate more time on CIMA. Right now, he rarely studies at home as he uses the hours on the train instead, so he still finds the time to go to the gym or go to a football match.

“When this project finishes I imagine it will eat into my evenings. Time management will become more important,” Richard says.

Charlotte has already reached that point and proactively plans how much daily time she can spend studying.

Charlotte spends an hour or more in the evening studying – especially when she has an exam coming up – but still finds time for socialising with friends. At weekends, she usually spends one day at college while her courses are running but she also makes sure that she has enough quality time with her boyfriend. Helpfully though, her boyfriend is also studying for the CIMA qualification. “It really helps having someone at home who understands – it also means I have somebody to practise questions with and fire random facts at,” she says.

Having some time off is possible due to the flexibility of CIMA’s on-demand exams offer, and both Charlotte and Richard agree that this is one of the benefits of studying with CIMA. Charlotte said: “Having the case study at each level now means that you’re able to apply this to an organisation, and also think about how the theory could help you in your real job. It’s also great how the focus becomes more strategic as you progress through the pillars.”

Richard also thinks that everything he learns is very relevant to his job: “Studying with CIMA has allowed me to be more relaxed in meetings with qualified accountants and CFOs. I feel my contributions are respected. When clients know you are part qualified, you hold a little more

gravitas when talking about finance related topics.”

Even before qualifying, Charlotte has experienced success, coming second in the world in her Operational Case study exam: “This has gained me a lot of recognition within the graduate scheme and wider workplace. It also continually encourages me to think ethically and holistically while at work and should help me continue to add value.”

Sometimes a bit of explaining needs to be done about CIMA. “People usually think it’s a cover for being a spy. My area of expertise is very niche, and often people have not heard of it before, it’s easier to generalise, usually I say I work in IT,” Richard jokes. However, he does have many friends who are already CIMAqualified or are currently studying CIMA as well.

Charlotte says that her friends and family take a real interest in what she and her boyfriend are doing, although they switch off if things get a bit too technical. “They are really impressed that we are so motivated to keep learning and developing ourselves,” she says. PQ • Thanks to Charlotte and Richard for sharing their Instagram photos with us

PQ Magazine January 2017

AAT exams PQ

U

nder AQ2016 you need to complete a new synoptic assessment before moving on to your next level. A synoptic assessment tests the knowledge you have gained throughout the level, covering multiple (but not all) units. It is a computer-based exam that you will attempt once you have completed the other core units within the qualification.

It has been introduced to demonstrate your knowledge of core accountancy skills, your ability to apply them in the workplace and further show employers your status as a qualified accounting technician – beyond just passing exams.

Synoptic assessments for the Level 3 Advanced and Level 4 Professional qualifications will be available to sit at six fixed times of the year, but your tutors will help you plan your studies around this.

How long are the synoptic assessments?

The duration of the synoptic assessment will vary depending on the qualification: • Foundation synoptic assessment is two hours.

• Advanced synoptic assessment is three hours.

• Professional synoptic assessment is three hours.

What does a synoptic assessment look like? These synoptic assessments are not trying to catch you out and therefore the

PQ Magazine January 2017

Get to the core Kaplan’s AAT team explains what synoptic tests are and how to tackle them

When will I get my marks for the synoptic assessment? All synoptic assessments for each qualification have an element of human marking, so it will take up to six weeks for the results to be available.

style and the look of these questions will be similar to what you have already seen in the individual unit assessments. Each synoptic assessment is going to be examining new content, so the whole exam itself is not going to be based purely on the other units.

What does it mean for you? As of 1 September 2016, students currently part way through a level had the option to transfer onto AQ2016 syllabus, or stay on the current one. If you remain on the current syllabus you have until 31 December 2017 and will not have to sit a synoptic assessment to complete it.

If you commence a new level after 1 September 2016 you will automatically be put onto the AQ2016 syllabus and will need to sit the synoptic assessment to complete that level.

You will need to sit the synoptic assessment after completing all other units on the Foundation & Advanced qualifications (Levels 2 and 3). For the Professional qualification (Level 4) you can sit it after you complete the compulsory units. PQ

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PQ careers

Karen Young explains on how PQs can ensure their skills stay relevant in a fast-changing profession

T

he accountancy profession is changing quickly, as new technology and a drive for ever more commercially-focused accountants makes the role of a traditional back office accountant a distant memory. As part of the next generation of accountants it is important that you develop the skills to thrive in the future early in your career and continue to prioritise your own professional development to keep up with the changing needs of the industry.

In our new research published in the Hays UK Salary & Recruiting Trends 2017 report, we found that nearly all (97%) of the PQs we surveyed felt they had the skills needed to fulfil their current role. However, only 77% of finance employers felt their organisations had the talent needed to achieve their objectives, indicating a mismatch in the profession between how capable PQs consider themselves to be, and employers’ confidence in their abilities.

With employers already reporting skill shortages and developments in technology and artificial intelligence reportedly threatening to replace some transactional finance functions, it’s important that the next generation of accountants hone their people skills in order to add value to businesses and remain relevant in the age of automation. Robots may have the

Future perfect

potential to add speed and efficiency to the profession, but ultimately it will be human accountants who will add the commercial nous and insight that the smartest of robots cannot rival. Commercial awareness is perhaps the most crucial non-technical skill a PQ can have; finance leaders regularly tell us that commercial awareness is a critical skill for an organisation’s future. You can develop this by arming yourself with an understanding of how your organisation operates and how your role relates to overall business goals.

To prepare for innovation in the finance profession, today’s trainee accountants should proactively keep up-to-date with changing technology and its applications in their role. The new breed of accountant will be proficient in cloud computing. As the initial anxiety surrounding the security implications of storing vast amounts of financial data in the cloud is ironed out, more and more organisations will look to reap the many benefits of cloud computing. For accountants working in the cloud makes business sense as it allows for easy access to accounts whilst not being constrained to working in the office. Key thought leaders in the industry are also predicting the rise in the use of optical character recognition (OCR) technology, so PQs should also familiarise themselves with this technology, which turns images into readable and editable text. For tomorrow’s accountant this could mean the end of hand-entered receipts.

Accountants are no longer expected to quietly work through spreadsheets and it is those PQs with acute business acumen and who are ready to harness digital developments that will champion the future of accountancy.

For more information and job opportunities for PQs visit www.hays.co.uk/pq PQ • Karen Young, Director, Hays Accountancy and Finance

ACCA Classes starting JANuary 2017 We have courses starting in January 2017 for the June 2017 exams University of Derby have re-launched their ACCA provision Come and learn in a modern and supportive environment Experienced Lecturers Revision classes available for the following papers for the June 2017 exams F4-F9 For further information visit our P1-P7 website or contact the ACCA Programme Director Nagin Lad E: n.lad@derby.ac.uk T: 01332 591171 W: derby.ac.uk/business

34

College of Business

PQ Magazine January 2017

careers PQ

social media ROUND-UP Twitter has finally introduced a mute button, which can be used to silence conversations, keywords and phrases.

This has been something users have demanded for some time. Twitter has finally agreed that it doesn’t want to get the reputation that it is a place where harassment can take place – that’s just not good for business.

We loved our ‘credit and debit Christmas tree’ that adorned last month’s front cover! However, not everyone got it. @mijetspie saw it and said: “Can we get any weirder #lol.” Samantha Blake came to our rescue on LinkedIn, saying: “Best tree I’ve seen all year.”

In our November issue we gave away not one but seven AAT courses, courtesy of First Intuition. To say our winners were excited would be an understatement. FI’s Nick Craggs tweeted one response: “I am in disbelief! THIS IS THE BEST NEWS I HAVE HAD IN AT LEAST THREE YEARS! This isn’t a hoax, is it? I am so shocked. Thank you so much.” That was nice. But we were worried that an FI AAT course was the best thing that had happened in this person’s life in three years. What happened that was so great three years ago? Keep your eyes peeled for our great giveaways throughout 2017.

In response to our lead letter this month (see page 6) we thought we better take a look at what reaction Syed Ammar Gillani got when he posted on the ACCA Global Wall Facebook page that the pass mark of ACCA exams should be 60% to ensure ‘quality’. One affiliate went back over his marks and found if the pass mark was 60% he would have passed just five papers, rather than the 14 he actually has passed! He commented: “…but 50 is adequate bro”. But Gillani was not alone. Mabvuto Phiri felt that 60% “is ok because it will add more value to the profession” and will help raise standards.

Oh, and we loved another Facebook comment: “100,000 trees a day are cut to produce exam papers. Say no to exams and save trees!” With all the accountancy exams going online there will be no excuses – and think of the trees being saved.

PQ Magazine January 2017

Life at Cyrus Controls Commercial director Allie Haggerty, 35, is based in Billinge, Merseyside, working for the business for 10 years. She has a degree in business studies from the University of Chester and is studying for ACCA Advanced Diploma in Accounting and Business What time does your alarm clock go off on a working day? 6am – I do have to get three kids ready for their day as well!

What’s the first thing you do when you get to your desk?

Switch on my laptop, straighten my stack of papers and get my pen at the ready.

What’s on your desk? Lamp, stationery, laptop and picture of my three kids and husband.

What’s the best thing about where you work? It’s a family business so being able to control our own destiny.

Where’s your favourite place to go for lunch? Pesto.

What (or who) can you see when you sit at your desk?

Cars, my husband, other work colleagues and my fish!

Which websites are your favourites and why? It depends on my mood and there are too

many to name.

Which websites do you use for work? Various government websites, Chas, British Assessment Bureau, VW, Siemens UK. How many hours a week do you spend in meetings?

Average three hours.

What time do you leave the office? Our office is our home so I never really switch off. I even work when the kids are in bed.

Sad I know!

How do you relax? Spa days, running, reading, crosswords.

What’s your favourite tipple?

Prosecco or gin.

How often do you take work home with you? Always!

What is your favourite TV programme? I have a quite an imagination so I love Game of Thrones.

Summer or winter? Winter until

February and then I am itching for Spring.

Pub or club? Definitely pub. My feet hurt in a club. However I do love to dance, so a pub with enough atmosphere to dance.

Who is your hero? Irena Sendler, a social worker in World War Two. She saved thousands of Jewish children even though she would face death if discovered.

If you had a time machine, where would you go? To ancient Egypt, to find out the truth about how the pyramids were erected.

If you hadn’t chosen accountancy, where might you be right now?I always come back to the workings of a business and my passion for numbers. So I believe I would have always boomeranged back to accounting no matter which path I took.

Bacs to be binned Regulators are planning a big shake up in the way businesses and consumers pay their bills. The Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) wants to bin the three main retail payment systems – Bacs, the Cheque & Credit Clearing Company, and the Faster Payments Service. In their place PSR wants a clearer and more secure system. It plans to introduce a ‘Confirmation of Payee’ to help prevent financial fraud by allowing people to avoid

sending payments to the wrong account.

In brief Feeling the fear A recent CareersinAudit.com survey found that a third of accountants fear the interview process. This goes up to 41% among accountants aged 18-30, perhaps not surprising given they have less experience in the workplace. The worry is that interview fear is such an issue that a fifth of all auditors and accountants surveyed admitted they would rather stay in their current job (even if unhappy) than move and have an interview!

Best job for builders Lego is looking for a new chief financial officer. Current CFO John Goodwin is to quit in 2017 after four years with the Danish giant. Among his duties are accounting, IT, legal, procurement, business services and corporate affairs. Lego has increased sales by 15% a year for the past 12 years and is now the world’s largest toy maker.

The PQ Book Club: books you should read What We Mean When We Talk About Strategy by Stuart Crainer and Des Dearlove (Infinite Ideas, £9.99) Strategy is something that can often be neglected as business leaders busily fight the operational fires that spring up on a daily basis. Yet, as the authors argue, you neglect strategy at your peril – they describe it as “the intellectual heavy lifting in the business world”. To this end, they have created a compendium of strategies for business in a series of easy-to-digest case studies (‘smorgasbord’, as they put it).

Chapter 5 is a key one, tackling ‘first principles’; the authors advise you to ask yourselves some vital questions.

These are ‘where are you?’; ‘where do you want to be?’; ‘what do you want to achieve?’; ‘what needs to change?’; ‘what are you good at?’; what is the context?’; and ‘how do you achieve your objectives?’. Ask yourselves these questions, tackling them from a number of different perspectives, and you will be on the road to formulating your strategy.

This book uses real-life examples to demonstrate how various strategies have helped businesses to thrive. These

include an explanation of how Continental Airlines went from basket case to major success in the 1990s, and how Wal-Mart took the US grocery market by storm.

Each chapter is short and to the point, typically just four or five pages in length. This makes the lessons of each easy to digest, and means it’s a great book to dip in and out of.

PQ rating 5/5 Fascinating and highly recommended 35

working better together Category Analyst

Assistant Tax Manager

FMCG, Surrey

Pharmaceutical, West London

To £33,000 + study package

To £40,000 + benefits

• You will form part of the UK FP&A team with responsibility for month end marketing expenditure.

• Business partner with the UK marketing team to contribute to the profitable growth of the business.

• Preparation of monthly margin reports and provision of commentary.

• Discussion with category/supply chain teams to understand drivers of variances.

• Supporting the process of new product development.

• Responsibility for the year end process relating to Media and Marketing expenditure.

• Leading the quarterly review with sales, customer services and demand planners.

• Provision of financial support to sales team on pricing issues.

• Support the Group Tax Manager on managing tax compliance in the UK and overseas.

• Managing group tax strategies including transfer pricing and financing arrangements and identifying further opportunities to optimise group tax arrangements.

• Responsibility for UK tax compliance (Corporation Tax, VAT and PSA returns), liaising with external providers.

• Assist in implementation of evolving transfer pricing arrangements across the Group.

• Maintenance of transfer pricing arrangements and assist in identifying further opportunities to optimise these.

• Assist in developing a programme to optimise R&D tax credit opportunities.

• Management of intercompany financing agreements.

• ATT part qualified or CIMA qualified looking to move into Tax.

redefining financial recruitment T +44 (0)20 8408 9999 E info@walkerdendle.co.uk www.walkerdendle.co.uk

ARE YOU HAPPY WITH YOUR SALARY? If you’re one of the 58% of part-qualified finance professionals who aren’t, check out the Hays UK Salary & Recruiting Trends 2017 guide.

With responses from 17,000 employers and employees, this is the most comprehensive review of pay, benefits and market trends across the UK, including: • Salary data across a range of finance professions and locations • Detailed market insights • Expert opinion from respected institutes and professional bodies, including ICAEW, ICAS and ACCA To find out more visit hays.co.uk/salary-guide

hays.co.uk/salary-guide © Copyright Hays plc 2016. HAYS, the Corporate and Sector H devices, Recruiting experts worldwide, the HAYS Recruiting experts worldwide logo and Powering the world of work are trademarks of Hays plc.

The Corporate and Sector H devices are original designs protected by registration in many countries. All rights are reserved. NQ-14883

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PQ got a story, funny or serious, you want to share? Email graham@pqaccountant.com

TIME FOR MAKE-UP AN AUTUMN

ONLY SAINTS NEED APPLY

Ryanair’s ‘misunderstood but beloved’ CEO Michael O’Leary recent put an advert for a new accountant on the airline’s careers board. But he was not looking for an ordinary accountant! Among the skills required – on top of treasury management and investment analysis – was someone who can cope with general drudgery and ‘MOL-ly coddling’. Another essential attribute is a thick skin, saint-like patience and an aversion to ‘bolloxology’. But this is not the most bizarre request! The ideal applicant also has to have their “own collection of nursery rhymes and bedside stories”.

There is little doubt that the ICB’s Garry Carter is one of the bestdressed men in accountancy. He really has style. The recent ICB Bookkeepers Summit had a 100% approval rating, so he is definitely doing something right! But we may have found out why he looks so good – make-up! Seriously though, we caught him just before he went on camera and he told us off for taking the picture – but here it is anyway.

TRUMP THERAPY ANYONE?

It has been reported that PwC in Australia is offering counseling to staff who are worried about Donald Trump’s election win.

In a letter to staff, CEO Luke Sayers said PwC’s values “will be vital” in the wake of the election results. He said that partners and staff have reached out to him about their concerns about reports of women being denigrated on the streets in the US and Muslims being told to go home.

TIME TO SLEEP ON IT

Can a nap really be better preparation for an exam than actually revising your notes? Well, yes it can, according to researchers at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore. They asked volunteers to attend an 80minute lecture. They were then split into three groups. One group went back over their notes for an hour, another watched a film and the final group took a nap. The groups were then asked to sit an exam containing 360 questions on what they had just learnt.

Those who had revised and the group who just slept on it scored highest; in fact, those who took a nap did slightly better.

Those who sat in front of a film did markedly worse.

TIME TO TAX YOUR STEAK? Steak should be the subject

of an extra 40% tax to help cut greenhouse gas emissions and push people to healthier diets, say Oxford University researchers. The study points out that taxing food according to emissions from its production would reduce greenhouse gases by more than is currently being produced by global aviation! A tax could also prevent half-a-million deaths a year from diseases linked to the over-consumption of meat and diary products.

’ WEV E

STATEMENT REVIEW Wetherspoon’s CEO Tim Martin is a man who says it as he sees it. So what did he say about Chancellor Philip Hammond’s first and last Autumn Statement: “Like any finance director who has just started a new job, particularly one with few financial qualifications, it was wise of the chancellor to underwhelm us with his approach. For pub industry survival we need tax equality with supermarkets – we pay 18p per pint in business rates and they pay 2p, and we pay 20% VAT on food and they pay nothing.”

SELFIE DEATHS ON THE RISE

The number of people who die each year taking selfies is on the rise. Back in 2014, some 15 selfie-takers died doing what they liked best. In 2015, the death toll rose to 39, and for the first eight months of 2016 that figure has jumped to a massive 73.

So how does that compare to, say, shark deaths? Well, according to the Shark Attack Survivors Record just eight people died in 2015. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University said the first report of a selfie-taker dying was recorded in March 2014. The most dangerous place to take a selfie is India, which has recorded 76 out of the 127 ‘deaths by selfie’. Pakistan is second with nine and the US third with eight.

WE ALL LOVE

A FREEBIE We all love a free giveaway with our magazines, be it a Lego model or a free pen, but CIMA recently excelled. With their FM magazine last month readers received their very own CGMA value wheel. No, they did! The wheel incorporates the Global Management Accounting Principles Competency Framework and Practice Areas. All we can say is bring back the slide rule…

GOT THE L OT

‘I Love PQ’ mugs are back We thought they were no more, and then we moved office and discovered we have a whole box full of our ‘I Love PQ’ mugs! To celebrate we are giving three away this month, so you can raise a mug to PQ in 2017! We will even give you a PQ memory stick as well. Hey, we are feeling generous!

To enter this giveaway draw send your name and address to graham@pqaccountant.com. Head up your email ‘PQ mug’ and we’ll do the rest.

Another bumper pack

We are again giving you the chance to collect a stack of books we have reviewed in both PQ magazine and sister publication NQ magazine. So you can win ‘Screw Work Break Free’ and ‘Big Data in Practice’. We are also throwing in ‘I Can’ by Richard McCann, ‘Awakening the Genius Within’ by Samuel A Malone, and ‘Property Entrepreneur’ by Vincent Wong. That’s over £90 worth of books.

Send your name and address to graham@pqaccountant.com – head up your email ‘Bumper pack’. We’ll then put your name in the draw.

Terms and conditions: One entry per giveaway please. You must send your name and address to be entered for the draw. All giveaway entries must be received by Friday 13 January. The main draw will take place on Monday 16 January 2017.

TO ENTER THESE GIVEAWAYS EMAIL GRAHAM@PQACCOUNTANT.COM 38

PQ Magazine January 2017

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