Chartered Accountant vs Certified Public Accountan

Chartered Accountants – But being a CA I am biased.

I recall a number of years ago (could be 5-10 yrs ago) they tried to merge the two bodies. But us younger Chartered Accountant members who did their PY (Professional year) did not want to merge as we perceived ourselves to be better.

I am not sure if CPA’s now have similar training or not now.

Hi Julia,

I agree with your sentiments.

I’ve been a CPA long enuff to have experienced 2 or 3 attempts to merge the two bodies – each attempt being thwarted by the CA’s desire to protect the sanctity of their precious Royal Charter.

And yes, we are the larger of the two accounting bodies and that brings with it the advantages you mention.

Unfortunately the majority of our members are in commercial accounting roles as opposed to public practice (as you and I are).

My personal belief (although this is not the forum to debate this issue) is that you and I (and those like us that share the public accounting stage with our CA brethren) should have been hived off to the CA 20 years ago. We would then have had an accounting body that specialised in public practice and another that focussed on the needs of the commercial accountant – which I’m sure you’d agree the needs of which are quite different.

I don’t think the merger will ever happen and that the fragmentation will continue to divide the industry – to the detriment of our public clients.

I DO KNOW that any future overtures will NOT come from the CPA’s

Let me also add, back at the last vote I had just finished becoming a CA. I spent long hours in the office on weekends and evenings studying when I could have done other things.

I did not feel that CPA’s put in the same effort.

Now 10 years later I really dont care if they merge.

Based on what has already transpired, albeit still on a friendly level, your question is a loaded one and I believe Bwendan it would be a better idea to remove this part of your post to prevent any further argument in this seemingly “hair splitting” exercise.

You have ascertained the difference between CAs and CPAs, now make up your own mind without dragging it/anyone else into the boxing ring!!! [offtopic]

Jo

Betterbiz,
You may have the right idea as I believe it can be a problem when the ATO and practitioners have the same professional body. But then some ATO staff are CAs so the whole thing needs re alining.

Bwendan,
Thanks for the information. I have sent it to the CPAs and asked why.

Julia Hartman
[email protected]
http://www.bantacs.com.au

I have done subjects from both streams and I can tell you without a doubt that the CA program is much more rigorous and demanding than the CPA program. In my day the CPA program gave you a large folder with all the notes you need. All you needed to do was read over it, understand it a bit, then do the completely multiple choice exam. I did only very light study for 2 subjects (info systems & mgt accounting) one semester, did about 3/4 of each exam properly, ran out of time and took a wild guess at the rest, and ended up with a credit and a distinction.

In contrast, I killed myself studying for tax in the PY (professional year – CA program), read numerous text and reference books (comprehensive notes were not provided), attended study groups, study courses, many late nights and FAILED the exam.

I believe the CPA program is a bit harder now, with short answer and essay questions as well as multiple guess. I am a CPA, but I can understand how CA’s think they’re better. They certainly jump over higher hurdles to get their qualification.

Having said that, a high academic ability may not necessarily translate into ability in providing a great service to a client. In my day you needed a much higher school leaving score to get into Medicine at Sydney Uni than NSW uni. Does that mean all Sydney Uni graduate doctors are better than all NSW uni doctors? Don’t think so. That’s why there are brilliant CA’s and brilliant CPA’s, just like there are dodgy CA’s and dodgy CPA’s. One CA I dealt with who was a tax manager at PwC was in the paper for being busted by a govt department for running a dodgy superannuation trustee business.

So, if you are asking because you are looking for someone to provide accounting services to you, there are both CA’s and CPA’s that are qualified and competent to meet your needs. Best is to ask around the successful people you know and see who they use. When you are assessing an accountant, ask to speak to their existing clients. If you provide great service to happy clients, you will only be too happy to let prospective clients speak to your greatest fans. So if they can’t or won’t provide reference clients, don’t use them.

Hope this helps.

Right. Good on yer for thinking about your future career. The best thing to do is talk to CA’s and CPA’s and ask them what their career path was, how they benefit from membership, what pain they went through to qualify for either qualification.

Certainly if your ambition is to rise through the ranks of a large accounting firm to partnership (say in audit, tax, insolvency or business services) then you would pretty much have to go the CA route (unless your area of specialisation was management consulting or IT audit, as these two disciplines often don’t require CA, even within a chartered firm).

Traditionally those who start off in the finance department of a commercial company would look at CPA program, but some larger companies (eg. Westpac, BHP) do support the PY.

If you wanted to do audit/tax/business services as a CPA there are plenty of CPA firms out there in public practice. They tend to be smaller suburban firms though. There is no CPA equivalent to a PwC.

Most jobs I see advertised (excluding those in chartered firms) for accounting jobs specify CA OR CPA. Very few ask for CA but exclude CPA. I haven’t seen any ask for CPA but exclude CA.

It really depends what you want to do. Some choices are:

Within Chartered Firm:

Audit
Tax (Personal or Corporate)
Business Services
Insolvency
Management Consulting
IT Audit
Corporate Finance

Within Other Kind of Company:

Financial Accountant (produce financial statements)
Management Accountant (work out how to make more money)
Treasury Accountant (work out where money is supposed to go in a bank)
Fund Accountant (Do the books for investment funds managed by your company)
Systems Accountant (Fiddle with computer systems)
Software Consultant (Sell or implement financial software)

There are also non-accounting jobs which an accounting background is good for. Like:

management trainee programs at big companies are usually good.
Sales – selling financial products, insurance, mortgages etc.
Purchasing – buying stuff for big companies (eg. deciding who to buy biscuits from for Coles)

These are just a few examples. The accounting degree gives you such broad skills as to enable a very wide choice of career.

If you have any further questions, feel free to ask. As an old fogey (35) who never had any guidance when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do, I’m only too happy to help anyone I can.

eeshole

Personal “One-upmanship” is soooo,…..anoying! It detracts from all the good info on this site.

Just email/PM each other so that our learning isn’t interupted. Please.

eeshole, thank you for your contribution. I have not followed the path of accountancy, but as a ‘Nut-n-Bolts’ kinda person, I have always been interested in the subject.
I like management accountancy – it is the only thing I have seen so far that, not only looks at right now, but also looks ahead so you can make plans!

Cheers

C@34