Professional, Practical, Proven

October 2013

Integrated Accounting Systems Fóla O’Grady

2 5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems

Syllabus Review / Sample Papers Review / Other Materials (KP)

Performance Review 12-13

Exam papers 13-14

Exam dates 2014

Exam procedures 2014

Correction Procedures 2014

Grades, certifications, compensations etc

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 3

Syllabus Review / Sample Papers Review / KP

• Payroll (20%) / Accounts (60%) / Excel (20%)

• 3 x Sample Papers – Garden Supplies Ltd 2013/2014 Payroll (20%) / Accounts (60%) / Excel (20%) Printing marks inc. in each section. • KP – Sage Micropay

– Focus on Customers and Suppliers

– Bank Module & Accounting for Leases/Loans

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 4

• 2012/2013 Exam Performance

-80% pass rate – 1st Sitting

-60% pass rate – 2nd Sitting

Performance Review 2012/2013

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 5

Performance Review 12/13

- Examination of areas of weakness (Average mark per section)

Average marks Payroll Accounts Excel

Sage ROI 87% 79% 76%

TAS 84% 79% 71%

TOTAL 85.5% 79% 73.5%

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 6

- Examination of areas of weakness

Topic Common Errors

Payroll Poor Calculations, not updating employees, wrong insurable weeks, not familiar with BIK, taxable and non-taxable elements of pay, P30 completion (n/a 2013/2014), not producing the requested reports

Accounts

Not changing the company name. Not posting the Salary Journal, not breaking down the salary journal, using the suspense account, not setting up nominal accounts correctly (NB for TAS students), allocating transactions, confusing the lease repayment value with the lease depreciation value, bank reconciliation, the depreciation journal, incorrect dates, accruals. Printing the wrong reports or no reports.

Excel Omitting formatting, printing on multiple pages, frequently incomplete. Exporting the wrong trial balance. Including depreciation in the cashflow.

Backing Up A number of students do not back up their datasets as requested.

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 7

- Integrated Accounting Systems 2013/2014

Topic Items to Note

Payroll

• Sage Micropay is the current payroll software.

(Brief outline of changes to follow).

• Requested reports will be the Gross to Net, Control Summary & payslip.

• The P30 has been removed from the exam paper.

Accounts • The lease interest suspense account is now referred to as a deferred

lease interest account throughout.

• Easier exporting from Sage 50 Accounts to Excel.

Excel • No references to .csv files

• Increased detail in instructions

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 8

- Integrated Accounting Systems 2013/2014

Sage Micropay

Admin access is required to setup new companies – log in using Admin and Pass

1. Create a new company

2. Create a new payroll within the company

3. Create user rights e.g. User 1 (should only have to be done once).

Log out and log back in to the selected company using the User1 ID and PASS.

The company Accounting Technicians Ireland should be created during installation.

The setup datasets (for the sample papers) can be restored into this company.

• Full instruction is provided in the IAS manual

Refer to pages 13-16 and 22-23.

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 9

Exam papers 13/14

• 2 Papers – 1st Sitting 2014

• 1 Paper – 2nd Sitting 2014

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 10

Exam dates

April 2014: 5th - 11th April 2014 (inclusive) August 2014: 25th – 30th August 2014 (inclusive)* * Please note that the August IAS exam session will now take place the week after the main exam session

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 11

Exam Procedures

• Procedures

• Rules & regulations

5th October 2013 Integrated Accounting Systems 12

Update 2014

• This will be the final year in which TAS will be examinable on the Accounting Technicians Ireland Syllabus

• From 2014/2015 onwards the IAS module will be based on SAGE software only

• Students will be given one further opportunity to repeat the TAS exam in 2015

13

Questions & Answers