Retrain in Accountancy?

[JarvisIsland]

I’m looking to get out of a very niche role and industry that mean people struggle to sometimes understand what’s involved when trying to explain transferable skills.

I have post-16 qualifications in maths, chemistry and statistics, although my degree was unrelated. My dad was in tax for years before he died so it’s a familiar profession in a way. I’m handy with excel and can navigate a tax return unaided. I can afford to start at the bottom to a degree as long as there was progression within a couple of years. But I’m early 40s now. I can study online but how realistic are job opportunities for someone who’s only done say AAT level 2 and/or 3. Bearing in mind I’m not fresh out of uni but have got years of tolerating office politics and dealing with difficult ‘customers’. Or are there better courses to study? I have transferable attributes, attention to detail, logical and problem solving skills, happy with a deadline or 6 but no real ‘industry’/on the job bookkeeping type experience etc that will probably lose me out.

I know on paper it’s not massively glamorous/exciting sounding but I need something that I can continue into later life, that isn’t physical shift work. Any thoughts from those in the role or recruiting to finance roles would be massively appreciated.

I retrained in Accountancy in my early 40s. I did AAT levels 3 and 4 (skipped level 2 due to having City and Guilds bookkeeping quals). It took me a while to get a job afterwards but have now been doing it for over 10 years. I enjoy it but am not fantastically well paid. I probably could have earned more if I’d been more ambitious, but have sacrificed earning ability because I preferred a job that is flexible and local.

There is a thread you might find helpful about retraining in accountancy.

here

I did it in my 30s. Start AAT level 3, try to get shadowing or volunteer experience then start ACCA or CIMA, if you’re lucky you may find a job with training, this opens the door for ACA as well. There are higher level apprenticeships too. Temping is an option and jobs in admin with some finance, eg invoice processing.

ACA is usually practice accounting while CIMA is industry based, ACCA is both and offers more flexibility. Industry is usually better for work life balance.

Tax has additional exams eg CTA.

I’ve progressed well but not as fast as I could have. In five years I could have been a controller for example, earning 70k plus. I chose to move into the performance analysis side which is more interesting. My salary isn’t far off but next step is management so I’m resisting.

Other people have slower progression as employers can be bad at developing staff - move if this happens, good managers are out there. Being older really helped once in the job, but recruiting managers can be prejudiced, they will often be younger than you.

BTW, I think you should probably aim to go beyond AAT if you want a good second career. I just couldn’t face more exams at that stage! If you are interested in going into tax, there is ATT as well.

Why an accountancy qualification and not a tax qualification?

Be careful as AI is replacing a lot of accountants, now they’re needing more low paying admins to oversee it, but less high paid jobs will be available (from what I hear / see)

Look at tax trainee jobs with medium or large firms. They aren't just for new grads any more (though most people on the course will be). See what firms local to you are open to career changers and get networking.

They would put you through your exams, probably whether on a formal training course or not, so best to concentrate on aiming for a job rather than learning a bit of book-keeping.

Thanks @HumanRightsAreHumanRights lots of good info there. I’m not after major high flying to be honest, but would like the ability to get to £40-50k / yr level within a reasonable time frame (currently on 44k but good savings to cover a drop for a few years). Will definitely explore the job with training route too. I didn’t really consider that as an option outside of big player grad schemes so good to know it’s more widespread.

Come to HMRC! 🙂

I would apply for tax assistant/graduate jobs tbh and do exams while working. Depends where you live but I think starting salary is around £25k now. I was on £44k as an assistant manager in private client tax. It took me 6/7 years to get there but you can do it quicker. You get a big salary bump after completion of CTA but it’s so so so difficult I’m not sure I’d recommend it to anyone 🥲

The problem with accountancy is overtime is pretty much essential all year and you don’t get paid for it. It’s not the great career it once was in my opinion.

I would have loved to work for HMRC but there wasn’t an office near me.

HMRC is a great idea @emsyj37 ! Though now there are so few offices it's very location-dependent.

Yes there’s no HMRC near me, I’d have to do 90mins+ to London by train and actually it would have to be a pretty big salary jump up from my current 40k+ to make me commute by train into London