AIBU to retrain as an accountant at 28 after setbacks?

[Lunalara]

I have for the most part recovered from the horrible depression that I had, but I am still feeling a bit disappointed as to how little I have achieved, especially in adulthood. I used to play for the adult chess team as a child and achieved a distinction in my masters. Then I failed my PGCE and lost any remaining self esteem I had as the whole process was humiliating to me.

I have had a think about what I want to do. I would like to retrain as an accountant. I have an A in GCSE maths, but haven’t touched anything maths like since then. I have done some practice studying to get a feel for accountancy, and I do think I would enjoy it. The problem is I am 28 with not a whole lot to show for it.

Apprenticeship?

Part time maths pgce?

Thank you for the encouragement. I want to get more out of my life than what I have now. It was probably a mistake of mine to study languages, but it was my standout talent at the time and was led to believe that I would have good options as a career.

I would be open to doing an apprenticeship especially if I find I can’t get onto anything else.

I tried teaching and it didn’t work out for me. It was a mixture of me not being a good fit for the job and being bullied out of the course.

Part time may be an alternative?

I starting taking the AAT qualifications when I was 25. I worked as an accounts assistant alongside this but was self funded. It can be hard to do it distance learning, especially the higher levels. I am fully AAT qualified and work as a self employed book keeper/accountant. I work for a range of small local companies and individuals and I have taken on several new clients over the last few years. With Mtd coming in for income tax, there are a lot of individuals that want help with their accounts. They are pushing AI on a lot of the software which is making it expensive but I can't see it replacing the work I do any time soon.

I think this thread is being unnecessarily negative. Accountancy is a good profession with lots of different elements. Some will be replaced by ai but lots won’t.

as you mentioned try find a training contract to work and then study alongside it (hopefully with the employer paying).

look into what kind of job you want to go into and what is available/ which qualification you want to do.

I would have to go through the school route, which would take a while just to get a qualified teacher pay. More importantly, I am anxious wasting more time on something that is likely to not work out for me based on past experience.

Maths pgce attracts £29,000 bursary

I wouldn't let age put you off. I started on a graduate training programme for the ACA when I was 27, and I wasn't the only one in my cohort. It was a three year training contract, working and studying. I'm now ACA and CTA qualified.

I would aim for the ACA or CTA over ACCA or ATT, if you have the ability to do so. They are harder exams, but command higher salaries and will offer better career progression. The ACA is broad and will offer a wider range of future career opportunities.

Lots of firms will be looking now for their ACA graduate training intakes for September starts. So if you're set on this path I'd start looking now.

I would definitely suggest the AAT qualification. Most local colleges do courses, either one day a week or during the evenings. My dd is just coming to the end of the first year of hers.

Businesses will always need accounts staff. AI can't walk down to the warehouse and collect delivery notes and discuss goods damaged on receipt can it, or count the cash receipts and work out who's had their hand in the till.

I have already received a bursary to do the first PGCE, so wouldn’t be eligible for another.

Maybe look into that. If its a different subject I think you can!

Most of my female friends dislike being an accountant tbh

Why don't you look into procurement? Start with a junior buyer role that pays 30-40k and pays well as you progress, you have to be good at maths, legal and negotiating with internal and external parties

Depends what direction you want to go in. I work in industry and we favour ACCA over ACA. ACA would be more valued in practise.

Things like AP invoices used to have to entered manually into your systems. Now, the supplier will email a dedicated inbox, where the system (AI) will read the invoice, and post it onto the AP accounts. Normally a very high success rate. Say goodbye to a team of AP people, entering everything manually with some (understandable) mistakes, and hello to just a couple of people managing any queries and initiating the payment runs.

AR is also much more automated than it used to be.

So you really want a job in the Management Accounts team, as opposed to the sub ledger teams. Harder to get as fewer of them. There were many more AR and AP roles, that acted as the entry point for many future management accountants - all gone or going.

I wish people would stop saying it is vulnerable to AI as if accountancy jobs are going to go poof all of a sudden. Yes AI can and is doing some of the tasks accountants used to do manually, e.g. extracting data from Excel, however it cannot make judgments with all the facts so they still need people. Also if you are using Co-pilot for example, it does 'hallucinate' so any results cannot be guaranteed to be accurate / factual so you need a human to review the results and verify.

My question to you OP is the job of an accountant the type of job you would like? The accountants I know spend long hours pouring over spreadsheets, they have to be analytical, excellent attention to detail and it can be monotonous. Also, depending on the speciality, they may go through peak auditing periods which means very long hours and tight deadlines.

If you already have a degree you could look for an accounting grad job now. Or as others have suggested, look for an accounts assistant role and start with AAT. I wouldn’t go back to uni for it tbh.

I think a common misconception with accounting is that it’s very maths-y. Of course it is to a degree, but it’s more analytical than adding and subtracting. If you’re working in practice then it’s also heavy on the customer service and team work aspects, lots of emails, phone calls, meetings, WIP/billing. Lots of deadlines which is good if you like structure like me!

Also - I am a CTA and in no way concerned that AI will take my job.

I will likely have to wait until August to apply for grad jobs, but it’s not too far off either. I am going to go for them even if I don’t succeed. Could also apply to AAT jobs as the same time. Are there many jobs around at this point of the year, or will I likely be waiting a bit until I can apply to them?

Go for it. You’re right you’ve got years and years left of working.
No job is bulletproof these days, we all change and adapt and keep going. Getting started and finding the opening position is the hard part. Best of luck

You might find there are some graduate roles that come up now if the previous candidate fell through - that’s how I got my first job. It was all very last minute and I was lucky that it all worked out. I think I applied in July, did a few assessments and interviews over the summer and started early October.

Otherwise yes in general larger employers start recruiting for graduate positions almost a year in advance. Smaller local firms will recruit throughout the year. I think with the current job market you just have to go for it and apply for loads to try and get your foot in the door.

Good luck ☺️

I know lots who do like accountancy. And once trained there’s lots of opportunities to move around into different roles

I’m well aware- and this has been the case for over a decade.

Claude AI can’t do any of that though.

I’m a chartered accountant, would say go for it. You can technically skip aat if you have a degree (I did) but does mean you have to pick up the basic bookkeeping concepts quickly without much experience and will probably need a training contract with an accountancy firm so will be stuck doing tax, audit etc vs industry finance. Personally I jumped ship into industry as soon as I was out of my training contract restrictions as salary much better.

if you do start as a basic level 1 apprentice though, I think salaries were like 15-18k so depends if you can survive on the money.