As this course is incredibly in-depth, you will cover a lot of material. The course will begin with the Level 2 Certificate material which is divided into five units.
Unit 1: Book Keeping and Transactions – explore financial transactions that are common within the book keeping system, process customer and supplier transactions, manage receipts and payments and use ledgers to process transactions to the trial balance
Unit 2: Book Keeping Controls – describe the various methods of payment, controls in the book keeping system, how to make use of control accounts and journals and reconcile a bank statement alongside a cash book.
Unit 3: Element of Costing – understand the cost recording system required for a business and make use of this system to record or extract information
Unit 4: Work Effectively in Finance – learn about the finance operations within an organisation, apply your communication, literacy and numeracy skills, work independently or as part of a team to manage responsibilities, discover how ethical values, principles and confidentiality are applicable in a finance environment and outline the benefits of sustainable values
Unit 5: Using Accounts Software – discover how you can use software to record and process transactions for both customers and suppliers, record and reconcile transactions, process and use journals for transactions, generate reports and prepare trial balance and general ledger reports.
Once these five units are complete, you have reached the end of the Certificate Course and can progress onto the AAT Advanced Diploma in Accounting at Level 3. This section of the course covers six units.
Unit 1: Advanced Book Keeping – learn the accepted principles of double entry book keeping and accounting, the procedures required for the recording of non-current assets, accounting for depreciation and adjustments, the purchase of non-current assets and the disposal of non-current assets as well as making preparations for the extension of trial balances.
Unit 2: Final Accounts Preparation – explain the process required to prepare final accounts, learn how to create accounting records with incomplete data, create final accounts for sole traders, understand legal and financial requirements for partnerships, prepare profit and loss statements for an appropriation account or prepare a position statement for a partnership.
Unit 3: Management Accounting Costing – describe the various costing systems that relate to an organisation, understand how to record and analyse cost information, apportion costs in line with business requirements, conduct analysis of budget deviations and issue management reports and use information from costing systems to facilitate decision making processes
Unit 4: Indirect Tax – learn about the regulations surrounding VAT, how to complete VAT returns in a timely and accurate manner, recognise VAT penalties and how to communicate VAT information.
Unit 5: Ethics for Accounting – outline the main principles that relate to ethical working, recognise ethical behaviour in relation to internal and external clients, understand when it is suitable to take further action in response to suspected breaches and recognise the responsibilities of professionals in terms of promoting sustainability
Unit 6: Spreadsheet For Accounting – develop the knowledge to use spreadsheets to collect, edit and organise statistical information, apply the relevant formulas and analysis tools and present, format and publish information using a spreadsheet