As the country in which we live increasingly feels the pinch it seems certain to ask us to pay more for our education. The Policy Exchange, for instance, recommends higher fees overall and a free market for universities to charge what they think the market will bear. You can read its recommendations here.
Apart from charging higher fees it is also inevitable that our higher education institutions will try and and save on the cost of teaching students and they are right to do so. There is no longer any good reason to think that the best way of teaching a class is by placing a lecturer at the front of a hall. Online courses are becoming a key part of the whole education system and will become increasingly important. Any university or college which does not deliver a large part of its courses online will find that it can no longer compete.
Fortunately accounting and bookkeeping are almost the ideal subjects to study by distance learning in general and online learning in particular. Find out more about courses at the Accounting and Bookkeeping College. You might find that they cost less than you think.
Thursday, 11 February 2010
Thursday, 4 February 2010
First law of economics isn't taught on an accounting course
Sometimes, just sometimes, the madness of the commodity markets briefly makes sense.
The price of crude oil has seen some of the more dramatic moments of market insanity in recent years soaring up to absurd heights to help trigger the international recession then plummeting in panic as it became clear that there was more than enough oil to fuel the worl for the time being. At both extremes the exaggerated price was not the inevitable collision of worldwide supply and demand but rather the behaviour of commodity buyers artificially creating and then removing demand as they expected their colleagues to be even more excitable than they themselves.
Now, though, OPEC is talking sense, "The risk is you see a lot of oil in the market and no one is buying it. Then the price will come down."
Something very similar happened to money, more specifically lending, in what has come to be known as the 'credit crunch'. This was in a financial market that some believed was so perfect that it couldn't fail.
How long will it be before the oil market or the financial markets fail again?
At the Accounting and Bookkeping College we aim to teach you how to measure and record movements of money. We can't, however, show you how to speculate successfully. whether it be in oil or financial derivatives or even property, because speculation is a skill that requires intuition rather than sense.
The price of crude oil has seen some of the more dramatic moments of market insanity in recent years soaring up to absurd heights to help trigger the international recession then plummeting in panic as it became clear that there was more than enough oil to fuel the worl for the time being. At both extremes the exaggerated price was not the inevitable collision of worldwide supply and demand but rather the behaviour of commodity buyers artificially creating and then removing demand as they expected their colleagues to be even more excitable than they themselves.
Now, though, OPEC is talking sense, "The risk is you see a lot of oil in the market and no one is buying it. Then the price will come down."
Something very similar happened to money, more specifically lending, in what has come to be known as the 'credit crunch'. This was in a financial market that some believed was so perfect that it couldn't fail.
How long will it be before the oil market or the financial markets fail again?
At the Accounting and Bookkeping College we aim to teach you how to measure and record movements of money. We can't, however, show you how to speculate successfully. whether it be in oil or financial derivatives or even property, because speculation is a skill that requires intuition rather than sense.
Tuesday, 5 January 2010
A happy new VAT rate
Naturally at the college we would like to wish you a happy new year.
Some acountants, however, have started the new year anything but happy about the revised rate of VAT which went back up to 17.5% on 1 January. It isn't so much the increase in the rate that will be causing dismay but rather the changes that will be required in the financial reporting systems of all UK businesses.
There are two main reasons why accountants in Britain should be ashamed to make a fuss about this. Firstly, we have known that the VAT rate was going back up ever since Alistair Darling reduced the rate as an emergency measure in 2008. Secondly. and more importantly, this ought not to be a difficult change to make. All mainstream accounting packages as far as I know, like the 'Sage 50' range, have the option to set the VAT rate throughout the entire package and changing the rate is done in moments.
What I suspect, however, and what I have seen in practice, is that a great deal of financial reporting is carried out outside of the bookkeeping process that is handled by each business' accounting packages. There are accountants up and down the country slavishly updating spreadsheets every week or month. Their worksheets have cells all over them where the calculation essentially multiplies the contents of another cell by 15% and every one of those cells now has to be changed to multiply by 17.5%. That this change is such a nightmare and so prone to error is yet another demonstration of how unfit for purpose many of these lovingly assembled spreadsheets are.
The fundamental mistake that all too many accountants fall into is to see bookkeeping as a preliminary function that takes place before the real work of the accountant gets done. Accurate and effective double-entry bookkeeping should be the main concern of every accountant. Intelligently designed and well-maintained books can not only be the historical records of a business but also the cost accounts, management accounts and financial statements. Not only that but they can also directly inform and update the budgeting process to complete the set of financial reports. So let the change of VAT rate be a lesson to you and get the beautifully accurate bookkeeping that goes into your accounting package to do the work.
Some acountants, however, have started the new year anything but happy about the revised rate of VAT which went back up to 17.5% on 1 January. It isn't so much the increase in the rate that will be causing dismay but rather the changes that will be required in the financial reporting systems of all UK businesses.
There are two main reasons why accountants in Britain should be ashamed to make a fuss about this. Firstly, we have known that the VAT rate was going back up ever since Alistair Darling reduced the rate as an emergency measure in 2008. Secondly. and more importantly, this ought not to be a difficult change to make. All mainstream accounting packages as far as I know, like the 'Sage 50' range, have the option to set the VAT rate throughout the entire package and changing the rate is done in moments.
What I suspect, however, and what I have seen in practice, is that a great deal of financial reporting is carried out outside of the bookkeeping process that is handled by each business' accounting packages. There are accountants up and down the country slavishly updating spreadsheets every week or month. Their worksheets have cells all over them where the calculation essentially multiplies the contents of another cell by 15% and every one of those cells now has to be changed to multiply by 17.5%. That this change is such a nightmare and so prone to error is yet another demonstration of how unfit for purpose many of these lovingly assembled spreadsheets are.
The fundamental mistake that all too many accountants fall into is to see bookkeeping as a preliminary function that takes place before the real work of the accountant gets done. Accurate and effective double-entry bookkeeping should be the main concern of every accountant. Intelligently designed and well-maintained books can not only be the historical records of a business but also the cost accounts, management accounts and financial statements. Not only that but they can also directly inform and update the budgeting process to complete the set of financial reports. So let the change of VAT rate be a lesson to you and get the beautifully accurate bookkeeping that goes into your accounting package to do the work.
Tuesday, 15 December 2009
Accounting for carbon
Today in Copenhagen government representatives from all over the world are trying to agree on how much carbon each country will be allowed to pump into the atmosphere in the coming years. At the Accounting and Bookkeeping College we hope that they will be able to put the interests of the planet above those of their government to ensure a sustainable future for us all.
At first sight there is very little in common between business bookkeeping and accounting for carbon outputs. The fundamental principle of double-entry bookkeeping, after all, demands that, for every transaction, we know where money, or value, comes from as well as where it goes to and when we have properly accounted for both then our books will balance. Carbon seems not to be like that and our carbon budget, in some cases, appears to be limited only by our financial resources, or money in other words. It seems we are unable even now to break this link so that wealthier nations want to use their money at Copenhagen to buy, as cheaply as possible, the opportunity to burn fossil fuels off poorer and less-developed neighbours.
If, however, we came to see carbon as a currency in its own right, and not one that could be cheaply exchanged for dollars or euros, then our whole approach to this emergency would change because every single person, business, organisation and population would have to take responsibility for staying in credit. Then we would all need to learn how to balance the books.
At first sight there is very little in common between business bookkeeping and accounting for carbon outputs. The fundamental principle of double-entry bookkeeping, after all, demands that, for every transaction, we know where money, or value, comes from as well as where it goes to and when we have properly accounted for both then our books will balance. Carbon seems not to be like that and our carbon budget, in some cases, appears to be limited only by our financial resources, or money in other words. It seems we are unable even now to break this link so that wealthier nations want to use their money at Copenhagen to buy, as cheaply as possible, the opportunity to burn fossil fuels off poorer and less-developed neighbours.
If, however, we came to see carbon as a currency in its own right, and not one that could be cheaply exchanged for dollars or euros, then our whole approach to this emergency would change because every single person, business, organisation and population would have to take responsibility for staying in credit. Then we would all need to learn how to balance the books.
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