How Difficult Are Accountancy Exams?
They are challenging exams, hence why they are so respected! But as you will see, it’s not necessarily the content, it’s the context of studying for these exams which is the most difficult aspect to overcome.
If you are considering studying for a level-7 professional accountancy qualification or you have just begun, you might be wondering how difficult the exams really are.
Here are my personal opinions on how difficult they are. I studied ICAEW/ACA so that’s where my experience comes from.
Quantity of content to learn
Although the content itself can be challenging to understand, the main issue for me was the quantity of information to learn/understand prior to each exam.
Working full-time
If you were sitting these exams on their own as if you were at university, they would probably be a piece of cake (or more cake like than they actually are). However, you are working full-time in a new and demanding role, so there is lots to learn on the job as well as at college. It felt like information overload!
Number of exams
I sat all my certificate-level and professional-level ACA exams in threes. I then sat CR and SBM together, and Case Study on its own. Despite SBM, CR and Case Study being the most challenging exams at the highest level of the qualification, I passed all these exams first time and I think a lot of that was down to sitting them as a two and a one. I failed a few exams at certificate-level/professional-level as I found sitting three at a time very challenging (from a memory point of view) - the workload was immense.
College
I studied in 2019 and then over Covid so I started out in college and ended up in virtual college, sat at home (and even sitting exams at home). I found college difficult as it was very fast paced, I didn’t have a maths/economics/numerical background, and I felt like other people were picking it up much faster than I was. However, virtual college actually benefitted me; I could re-watch bits of the lesson and take screenshots throughout. What I lost was the support of my peers and the community aspect to in-person college.
No study leave
I studied on a graduate apprenticeship at a top 6 professional services firm. Although we had college days/weeks and at the start we had some self-study days where we taught ourselves the content, we never had any study leave. I ended up using a lot of my annual leave to study and revise.
So as you can see, the most difficult aspect of studying the ACA wasn’t the content of the exams themselves (although some of them do have challenging concepts), it was the amount of content to learn and the environment in which you learn it.
Hope that helps anyone considering studying a level-7 accountancy qualification!
Hannah
support@accountancyhub.co.uk
