The CMA exams are computer-based and administered at hundreds of Prometric testing facilities worldwide. With three testing windows each year, you can sit for an exam at a time and place convenient for you.
If you are enrolled in the CMA program and are ready to sit for the exam, here are the steps:
The CMA exams are computer-based and administered at hundreds of Prometric testing facilities worldwide. With three testing windows each year, you can sit for an exam at a time and place convenient for you.
If you are enrolled in the CMA program and are ready to sit for the exam, here are the steps:
The pass rate on the CMA differs by geographic region, but averages about 35% on part 1 and 50% on part 2.
ICMA® (Institute of Certified Management Accountants) is the certification affiliate of IMA. ICMA is responsible for developing, administering, and grading the CMA (Certified Management Accountant) exam; establishing the policies and procedures for the CMA program; and for ensuring the program’s overall integrity. The ICMA Board of Regents is responsible for setting policies, and the ICMA staff is responsible for operations.
Exams are administered through the worldwide network of Prometric Testing Centers and are available in accordance with local customs. There are many locations throughout the U.S. and internationally.
To locate a test centre, please visit www.prometric.com/ICMA.
Exams are offered according to the following schedule:
To schedule exam appointments, visit www.prometric.com/ICMA or call (800) 479-6370. To ensure your first choice of date, time, and location, it is best to schedule your appointment at least four weeks in advance. All exam appointments must be scheduled at least 72 hours in advance of the exam date. Once you are registered, you must take the exam part during your assigned testing session. If for any reason you are unable to schedule an exam appointment during the assigned testing window, you will need to pay another registration fee. Appointments cannot be rescheduled to another testing window.
No, you can take parts 1 and 2 in any order. You have the option of taking both together on the same day, although many members choose to separate their testing dates.
When do I receive my exam Performance Reports?
Performance Reports are sent via e-mail from Prometric to all candidates who take an exam part. The performance reports are emailed approximately 14 days after exam results are posted to the candidate’s profile.
Candidates who do not pass the exam will receive a report that indicates their performance on each of the key topic areas in the multiple-choice section as well as their overall performance on the essay section of the exam.
For Professional Members:
For Student/Academic Members:
If I no longer wish to pursue the CMA program, what is the refund policy?
The CMA Entrance Fee is not refundable.
If you have not scheduled an appointment with Prometric, the examination fee is refundable within 30 days from the time you purchased the exam. A $25 processing fee will be deducted from the refund. We do not offer postponements of exam parts. You must sit in the testing window for which you purchased a registration.
No, exam extensions are not granted. You must take the exam in the test window that you are registered for.
The CMA Scholarship opportunity can be offered to up to 10 students per school per year who are interested in ursuing CMA certification. This includes both undergraduate and graduate students in accredited accounting or business programs. Multiple faculty members can submit nominations, but the limit is 10 per school, per academic year.
ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants), also known as Global CA is the world’s fastest growing accounting professional body. With 188,000 members and 480,000 students, ACCA has established its presence in over 180 countries across the world (such as UK, Singapore, Dubai, Australia, Canada, etc.).In India, ACCA members have great scope in MNCs such as PwC, EY, KPMG, Deloitte, Grant Thornton, BDO, Accenture, JP Morgan, etc
ACCA is the world’s most progressive and supportive accountancy body driving your career towards even greater opportunity.
The scope of ACCA in India is increasing at an exponential rate.
The advantages of pursuing ACCA are:
The scope for ACCA in India is growing at a tremendous pace. ACCA members are securing professional jobs all across the countries in companies such as EY, PwC, Deloitte, KPMG, Grant Thornton, BDO, Accenture, McKinsey, Tata, Barclay's, Standard Chartered, etc.
Profiles for ACCA members in India include Accounting Advisory, Risk Advisory, Corporate Finance, Audit and Assurance, Internal Audit, Taxation, Investment Advisory, etc
These job offers are for the same designation, profile, as well as salary packages as the Indian CAs. Further, there have been ACCAs from India who have secured jobs overseas in countries such as Australia, Singapore, Canada, Dubai, etc.
There are various options available for you once you become a qualified ACCA member:
No.
As an ACCA, you would not have signing authority, and consequentially, not sign audit reports and practice audit by setting up your own firm.
However, there are ACCAs working in audit firms in India (including the Big 4) who can work as part of the audit team. The partner signing the audit report must be a member of the ICAI.
Both the courses are valued and reputed.
The internship requirement is 3 years. This can be pursued before, during or after completing the ACCA exam. If a student is working in India, he or she would need to have the work experience certified by an ACCA or an Indian CA (ICAI member). This is similar to the article ship requirement in Indian CA (ICAI) .ACCA also expects 3 years’ work experience in the field of finance. Along with some performance objectives and a professional module to be attempted (you need only plan these once you have decided to enrol for the course).
The eligibility criteria for students vary for each country.
For India, students are eligible if they have completed:
10+2 / India School Certificate / Intermediate Certificate / Higher School Certificate / Higher Secondary Certificate / Pre-University Course/ All India Senior School Certificate/Senior Secondary School Examination
This is providing passes are held in 5 subjects (at least 3 in Year XII) including English and Mathematics / Accounts, mark of 65% in at least 2 subjects and over 50% on the others) (For the Higher Secondary Certificate the marks are out of 200, so over 130 meets the 65% requirement and over 100 meets the 50% requirement.)
Below is a breakdown of the grades in terms of percentage and actual grade.
50%-60% = Satisfactory = C1
60%-70% = Good = B2
85%+, 80%-85%, 70%-80% = A1–A2, B1
For students having completed Grade 10 or not eligible for the above, they can also commence their ACCA qualification through the Foundation in Accountancy (FIA) route.
For further details about the eligibility criteria, you can contact us at Zell Education and we would be glad to solve all your queries.
You can appear for 4 exams per attempt, and a total of 8 exams each year.
F1, F2, F3, F4 are known as on-demand exams. These exams can be attempted at any time of the year.
F5 to P7 exams are conducted 4 times a year (every March, June, September, December).
F1 – Accountant in Business
F2 – Management Accounting
F3 – Financial Accounting
F4 – Corporate and Business Law
F5 – Performance Management
F6 – Taxation
F7 – Financial Reporting
F8 – Audit and Assurance
F9 – Financial Management
P1 – Strategic Business Leader
P2 – Strategic Business Planning
P3 – Advanced Financial Management
P4 – Advanced Performance Management
P5 – Advanced Taxation
P6 – Advanced Audit and Assurance
What is the passing rate for the ACCA exams?
The average passing rate for ACCA exams globally is 40%.
Total 15 Subjects
Attempt 13 Subjects
What is the salary package for an ACCA in India?
In India, the salary package of a fresher ACCA member ranges between Rs. 6-10 lacs per annum. Majority of the ACCA members receive a package equivalent to that of an ICAI member (Indian CA) in companies such as the Big 4 (PwC, EY, Deloitte, KPMG) and MNCs.
International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) are a set of accounting standards developed by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) that is becoming the global standard for the preparation of public company financial statements.
The IASB is an independent accounting standard-setting body, based in London. It consists of 15 members from multiple countries, including the United States. The IASB began operations in 2001 when it succeeded the International Accounting Standards Committee. It is funded by contributions from major accounting firms, private financial institutions and industrial companies, central and development banks, national funding regimes, and other international and professional organizations throughout the world. While the AICPA was a founding member of the International Accounting Standards Committee, the IASB's predecessor organization, it is not affiliated with the IASB. The IASB neither sponsors nor endorses the AICPA's IFRS resources website (www.IFRS.com).
Approximately 120 nations and reporting jurisdictions permit or require IFRS for domestic listed companies, although approximately 90 countries have fully conformed with IFRS as promulgated by the IASB and include a statement acknowledging such conformity in audit reports
For many years, the SEC has been expressing its support for a core set of accounting standards that could serve as a framework for financial reporting in cross-border offerings. On February 24, 2010, the SEC issued release Nos. 33-9109 and 34-61578, Commission Statement in Support of Convergence and Global Accounting Standards. In the release, the SEC stated its continued belief that a single set of high-quality globally accepted accounting standards would benefit U.S. investors and its continued encouragement for the convergence of U.S. GAAP and IFRS. The release also called for the development of a work plan (the "Work Plan") to enhance both the understanding of the SEC's purpose and public transparency in this area. Execution of the Work Plan, combined with the completion of previously agreed upon convergence projects between the FASB and IASB, will permit the SEC to make a determination. On July 13, 2012 the SEC staff issued the Final Staff Report on the Work Plan for the Consideration of Incorporating International Financial Reporting Standards into the Financial Reporting System for U.S. Issuers. The report did not recommend a specific course of action. The final decision regarding whether to incorporate IFRS into the financial reporting system for U.S. issuers now rests with the SEC Commissioners. There is currently no estimated date for when such a decision might be made.
By adopting IFRS, a business can present its financial statements on the same basis as its foreign competitors, making comparisons easier. Furthermore, companies with subsidiaries in countries that require or permit IFRS may be able to use one accounting language company-wide. Companies also may need to convert to IFRS if they are a subsidiary of a foreign company that must use IFRS, or if they have a foreign investor that must use IFRS. Companies may also benefit by using IFRS if they wish to raise capital abroad.
Despite a belief by some of the inevitability of the global acceptance of IFRS, others believe that U.S. GAAP is the gold standard, and that a certain level of quality will be lost with full acceptance of IFRS. Further, certain U.S. issuers without significant customers or operations outside the United States may resist IFRS because they may not have a market incentive to prepare IFRS financial statements. They may believe that the significant costs associated with adopting IFRS outweigh the benefits.
Adoption would mean that the SEC sets a specific timetable when publicly listed companies would be required to use IFRS as issued by the IASB. Convergence means that the U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and the IASB would continue working together to develop high quality, compatible accounting standards over time. More convergence will make adoption easier and less costly and may even make adoption of IFRS unnecessary. Supporters of adoption, however, believe that convergence alone will never eliminate all of the differences between the two sets of standards. In 2011, SEC staff introduced a possible method of incorporating IFRS into the U.S. financial reporting system that would represent an endorsement and convergence approach for aligning U.S. GAAP with IFRS over a period of time. Ultimately, the expectation is that the SEC will make a determination on whether it will incorporate IFRS into the financial reporting system for U.S. issuers and, if it decides to incorporate IFRS, the method of incorporation.
The key players are the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is responsible for the supervision and regulation of the securities industry and has oversight responsibility for the FASB; the Financial Accounting Standards Board, an independent body that establishes and interprets U.S. GAAP; and the IASB, which is working with the FASB on the convergence of U.S. GAAP and IFRS. The AICPA has provided thought leadership to the IASB and the FASB on financial reporting topics
Until the Securities and Exchange Commission issues a rule allowing or requiring U.S. public companies to adopt IFRS, they must continue to prepare their financial statements under U.S. GAAP. Several large multinational corporations, however, have started using IFRS for their foreign subsidiaries where allowed by local law. Also, some U.S. subsidiaries of foreign-owned companies are also using IFRS.
The biggest difference is that IFRS provides fewer detailed rules than U.S. GAAP. IFRS also contains limited industry-specific guidance.
Because of longstanding convergence projects between the IASB and the FASB, the extent of the specific differences between IFRS and GAAP has been shrinking. Yet significant differences do remain, most any one of which can result in significantly different reported results, depending on a company's industry and individual facts and circumstances. For example:
Conversion to IFRS is much more than an accounting exercise. It will affect many aspects of a U.S. company's operations, from information technology systems and tax reporting requirements, to internal reporting and key performance metrics and the tracking of stock-based compensation.
What other areas of the profession will IFRS affect?
As IFRS grows in acceptance, most CPAs, financial statement preparers and auditors will have to become knowledgeable about the international standards. Others, such as actuaries and valuation experts who are engaged by management to assist in measuring certain assets and liabilities, are not currently taught IFRS and will have to undertake comprehensive training. Professional associations and industry groups have begun to integrate IFRS into their training materials, publications, testing, and certification programs, and many colleges and universities are including IFRS in their curricula. Some textbooks are already covering IFRS, primarily in a comparative presentation to their instructions on U.S. GAAP.
The AICPA's governing Council in May 2008 approved amending Rules 202 and 203 of the Code of Professional Conduct to recognize the IASB as an international accounting standard setter. That removed a potential barrier and gives U.S. private companies and not-for-profit organizations the choice whether to follow IFRS.
Our head of marketing, Chris Pitt, answered this question in his marketer’s three-minute guide to data science last year.
“Data science is the practice of revealing hidden insight from existing data in a manner that enables businesses to make better decisions.” – Chris Pitt, head of marketing at Vertical Leap
All marketers today use data to some extent, but not all data processes are as effective as each other. Data science is the theory and practice of using the right data processes and data points to extract valuable insights and ultimately make informed business decisions.
There’s a whole world of data out there, but not all of it will be useful to you. Data science filters out what you don’t need, collects everything you do in the most efficient way and puts processes in place for you to turn cold numbers into better performance.
In the current marketing environment, data science involves a series of steps to ensure you’re getting the most from your data. In most cases, the process will look something like this:
One of the biggest problems facing modern businesses is that they’re overwhelmed by data – most of which they don’t even need. The first crucial step is to identify the data that holds value to your targets and then it’s all about putting the right processes in place to collect and handle that data (with a good bit of help from algorithms and automation). This is the same kind of data science that builds Google’s deep-learning algorithms, driverless cars and other AI tech innovations.
The thing with this question is, it’s important to understand that the technology used by data scientists has rapidly evolved over the past 10 years. Now, you don’t need huge teams of data scientists, collectors and analysts to get these insights. With the automation tools available today, plus the latest advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence, small businesses can now ‘do data science’ in a way that previously only the biggest organisations could afford.
This has really levelled the playing field in terms of businesses using data science to improve performance and growth. Those who don’t respond to this opportunity soon enough are going to get left behind by their competitors who do.
In theory, data science can help improve any area of your business where the relevant data is available. This isn’t limited to marketing either. For example, you could use data to test whether overtime is really helping your business get more done, to discover the optimum wage to pay your staff or to trial flexible working patterns.
Generally speaking, the overall goal of data science is to help you improve business results. This normally translates into being more productive, efficient or testing various methods (e.g. flexible working vs the usual 9-5 setup).
The key thing is that you’re getting these answers from solid data, normally in large volumes that you’d never be able to handle without data science or the latest technologies related to it – namely automation and machine learning.
In a marketing sense, it mostly comes down to handling datasets that would otherwise be too large for you to deal with. If you’re a small business, analysing five years of data to spot how weather patterns affect your sales isn’t something you can do manually – even the largest of businesses would struggle to do this.
However, with the right data processes in place, you can sit back while algorithms compare the past five years’ weather data and cross-reference it with public holidays, sporting events, geographic locations and any other datasets you decide are important.
Five years not long enough for you? Fine, add a zero on the end and analyse data for the past 50 years if you think it will improve the quality of your insights.
With the automation and machine learning technology readily available today, data science can be applied on pretty much any scale, regardless of how big your business or marketing team may be. The only limits are the data you have available and the quality of your processes.
At this point, it’s probably best to run through some specific uses of data science and the problems it can help you solve. Here are some of the most common marketing problems we’re using it to solve for our customers:
These are some of the most fundamental problems data science can solve for every business, but there are thousands of other ways it can improve your business, depending on the unique issues you face. For example, you can pinpoint false economies where using cheaper materials is actually costing you more in the long run or discover a new business location where you should be opening.
Machine learning is a particular application of artificial intelligence (AI) that use algorithmic models to spot patterns in datasets. Even relatively basic machine learning algorithms can analyse volumes of data and derive conclusions – for example, it could determine which combination of post-sale interactions most commonly lead to a second purchase.
More sophisticated machine learning processes are able to take these insights and teach themselves over time. This drives a wide range of technologies such as predictive analytics, driverless cars and natural language processing.
There are various technologies within data science, such as artificial intelligence. Within AI, you have machine learning. In other words, machine learning is one of many subset technologies that data science has made possible.
So rather than data science and machine learning being different per se, it’s more a case of machine learning being a part of data science.
Once again, without data science the practical concept of artificial intelligence wouldn’t be possible. AI is very much a work still in progress, but the goal is for technology to mimic or improve upon the human process of cognitive thinking and decision making. Any application of artificial intelligence – no matter how sophisticated – relies entirely upon data and a system’s ability to interpret this data.
So, while not all data science is artificial intelligence (or machine learning), AI in the practical sense wouldn’t exist without the theories or practices crafted/discovered within data science.
Data science is nothing new but advances in AI, machine learning and automation have made it accessible to businesses of all sizes, lowering the cost of entry dramatically. Data science doesn’t necessarily cost you anything at all – for example, using Google Ads snippets to automate parts of your PPC strategy.
The truth is you’re already using data science in every part of your marketing strategy, whether you’re actively developing those processes or not. Every time you open up Google Analytics, ask your customers for feedback or run an A/B test, you’re using data science.
The entry price into data science is close to zero now but the more important question is – how much can you do with data science? Whatever your budget, data science can turn it into better performance and business decisions.
What you need to do is determine how much of this budget should be dedicated to data science. Keep in mind that modern data science is a highly-automated process, which means you should get a big return on your initial investment. More to the point, data science can increase the ROI of your marketing strategies across the board.