Audit vs Tax (Urgent)

Helenm98

Hi guys,
I'm going into my final year doing UCD Commerce. I'm doing a summer audit intern in (CTB) at one of the BIG4. The firm may offer me training contract. I'm so stressed cuz I'm not sure if I want to go into tax or audit.
I don't quite like audit cuz there's a lot of travelling, I prefer to stay at office and more routine work. but Audit's actual role is interesting . I never tried tax but I feel that it's quite good if it's mathsy. but I heard the tax exams are extremely hard. I feel like I don't have the ability to take tax. I'm really struggling in choosing.

I'm sacred that i'll make a wrong choice. by any chance, I can go wth audit first then after being qualified, could I move to tax?
also In FAE, students get to choose either audit or tax option. does it matter if I chose audit option even if I'm going for tax?

any advice is highly appreciated!

Paddy001

Hi

Yes it’s possible to move to tax and do tax exams after you’ve become qualified with CAI.

If you don’t know what you want, audit could be a good base and you could then move towards tax if it appeals to you more.

OttoPilot

Helenm98 wrote: »

Hi guys,
I'm going into my final year doing UCD Commerce. I'm doing a summer audit intern in (CTB) at one of the BIG4. The firm may offer me training contract. I'm so stressed cuz I'm not sure if I want to go into tax or audit.
I don't quite like audit cuz there's a lot of travelling, I prefer to stay at office and more routine work. but Audit's actual role is interesting . I never tried tax but I feel that it's quite good if it's mathsy. but I heard the tax exams are extremely hard. I feel like I don't have the ability to take tax. I'm really struggling in choosing.

I'm sacred that i'll make a wrong choice. by any chance, I can go wth audit first then after being qualified, could I move to tax?
also In FAE, students get to choose either audit or tax option. does it matter if I chose audit option even if I'm going for tax?

any advice is highly appreciated!

A lot of travelling is an exaggeration. Financial services audit is usually Dublin City Centre and a lot of non fs will be based in Dublin too, maybe not central but accessible from the m50.

Helenm98

what about If I got ACA and CTA qualifications, could I switch to audit whenever I want since I've the ACA in hand. Thanks

OttoPilot

Helenm98 wrote: »

what about If I got ACA and CTA qualifications, could I switch to audit whenever I want since I've the ACA in hand. Thanks

You could if you really wanted to at the moment. I've never heard of anyone doing it though because why would you? Step down in salary and seniority most likely. If you didn't like tax I imagine you would move to industry first.

souvikroy1111

Hi. I would be starting as Tax Trainee this year in a Big 6 firm and would be doing both ACA and CTA qualifications. I did a lot of research (for a good few months and talked with many professionals) on whether to go for Audit or Tax before finally choosing Tax, so i believe I am eligible to answer your query.

Travelling: In Audit, most of your time spent will be on client's location but it will be mostly in and around Dublin. In Tax, most of the time will be spent on your office. So if you are someone who is not keen of travelling and want to work on the same office everyday, Audit is not for you.

Overtime: In busy seasons, overtime is mandatory in Audit which might even extend to beyond midnight in some cases. Even in non busy seasons, you might be required to do overtime. The worst part is that there is no overtime pay, you only get time-in-lieu which is only limited to a certain hours. Tax is basically a 9 to 5 job and you might have to do overtime in busy seasons but its nothing like Audit.

Pay: Pay should not be your deciding factor and infact there is a very minimal difference of pay between the two, if any. Tax professionals might get a couple k's more than Audit but in many cases, its basically the same. The real reason is that the are scores more Audit professionals compared to Tax. Big 4 tends to hire few hundreds Audit Trainees every year compared to less than 100 for Tax Trainees.

Career growth (imp): Both are excellent in terms of career progression. But its important to note, that once you are in tax you are always into Tax. Tax is a very specialised area and once you are into it, its extremely difficult to move out of it. There are various rewarding areas of Tax you can specialise in such as Corporate Tax, Transfer Pricing, VAT and the list goes on and on but is basically TAX. The beauty of Audit is that the exit opportunities is very good. You can work in industries in various positions and into investment banking with some hard work. But if you want to stay in a Professional Service firm, then it does not make any difference.
As you mentioned above about moving from Tax to Audit or vice versa, its almost impossible to move from Audit to Tax or vice versa in a BIG 4 or even in Top Mid Tier firm since in all 3.5 years of your contract, you would be working only on either Audit or Tax and even if you do ACA in Tax, you will have to start from the beginning.

Exams: Both Audit and Tax requires you to do ACA. You should not worry about the CTA exam being hard to crack, since once you have completed your ACA exams, with the knowledge you have gained from there, it should not be difficult to pass but hard work is always necessary.

I hope you can decide what to do after reading this, and feel free to message me if you have any doubt.

Helenm98

souvikroy1111 wrote: »

Hi. I would be starting as Tax Trainee this year in a Big 6 firm and would be doing both ACA and CTA qualifications. I did a lot of research (for a good few months and talked with many professionals) on whether to go for Audit or Tax before finally choosing Tax, so i believe I am eligible to answer your query.

Travelling: In Audit, most of your time spent will be on client's location but it will be mostly in and around Dublin. In Tax, most of the time will be spent on your office. So if you are someone who is not keen of travelling and want to work on the same office everyday, Audit is not for you.

Overtime: In busy seasons, overtime is mandatory in Audit which might even extend to beyond midnight in some cases. Even in non busy seasons, you might be required to do overtime. The worst part is that there is no overtime pay, you only get time-in-lieu which is only limited to a certain hours. Tax is basically a 9 to 5 job and you might have to do overtime in busy seasons but its nothing like Audit.

Pay: Pay should not be your deciding factor and infact there is a very minimal difference of pay between the two, if any. Tax professionals might get a couple k's more than Audit but in many cases, its basically the same. The real reason is that the are scores more Audit professionals compared to Tax. Big 4 tends to hire few hundreds Audit Trainees every year compared to less than 100 for Tax Trainees.

Career growth (imp): Both are excellent in terms of career progression. But its important to note, that once you are in tax you are always into Tax. Tax is a very specialised area and once you are into it, its extremely difficult to move out of it. There are various rewarding areas of Tax you can specialise in such as Corporate Tax, Transfer Pricing, VAT and the list goes on and on but is basically TAX. The beauty of Audit is that the exit opportunities is very good. You can work in industries in various positions and into investment banking with some hard work. But if you want to stay in a Professional Service firm, then it does not make any difference.
As you mentioned above about moving from Tax to Audit or vice versa, its almost impossible to move from Audit to Tax or vice versa in a BIG 4 or even in Top Mid Tier firm since in all 3.5 years of your contract, you would be working only on either Audit or Tax and even if you do ACA in Tax, you will have to start from the beginning.

Exams: Both Audit and Tax requires you to do ACA. You should not worry about the CTA exam being hard to crack, since once you have completed your ACA exams, with the knowledge you have gained from there, it should not be difficult to pass but hard work is always necessary.

I hope you can decide what to do after reading this, and feel free to message me if you have any doubt.

Hi souvikroy1111,
Thank you so much to take time and really explain it to me. The information is very insightful. I do find Tax more appealing, it's just i'm not too confident to do the tax exams ITI. I'm afraid that If I did pass ACA but did not pass the tax ones, I'll lose everything at once. so that's why I was thinking on doing audit first, at least i'm qualified for something , and then move to tax. After reading your post, It feels like this way it's impossible.

By any chance, do you know if it is easy to move from Big 4 to industry (external audit to internal audit)? Would there be much difference in the work?

Thank you very much!

:)

Risteard

Helenm98 wrote: »

Hi souvikroy1111,
Thank you so much to take time and really explain it to me. The information is very insightful. I do find Tax more appealing, it's just i'm not too confident to do the tax exams ITI. I'm afraid that If I did pass ACA but did not pass the tax ones, I'll lose everything at once. so that's why I was thinking on doing audit first, at least i'm qualified for something , and then move to tax. After reading your post, It feels like this way it's impossible.

By any chance, do you know if it is easy to move from Big 4 to industry (external audit to internal audit)? Would there be much difference in the work?

Thank you very much!

:)

Agree with most of the quoted post, but just want to comment that at least in my firm I know of at least one person that transferred to the Tax department (and didn't just do the tax exams) following completion of their training contract in Audit.

There is a big push to try and retain people so they try and facilitate transfers to other departments so at least in my firm it would be possible following completion of the ACA contract to try and move to Tax.

On the External vs. Internal, External is pretty much solely focused on the financial statements and related control in the event of a PCAOB client.

From speaking to people that left and joined internal audit, the role is more broad where you can be auditing operations, and not just financial statements.

Someone that trained in External Audit would be well placed for a role in internal IMO. (Though why you would want to go to IA I don't know :pac:)

Additionally, depending on the internal audit role, there could be much more travel, particularly in the case of a multinational who are probably more likely to have an internal audit function.

I'd also like to point out that a large number of tax trainees do the ACAs as well as the Tax exams. So if Tax is the area that you want to pursue, it wouldn't necessarily preclude you from doing the ACAs either.

TaxPro

Big 4 tax qualified now working in industry here.

You're right on travel - I barely if ever leave the office, which has its ups and downs, but if you're not keen on travelling around then tax beats audit on that front.

The tax world is very diverse and can be interesting, and audit can often be quite monotonous at times (particularly in the early years). That said, audit provides a much great array of opportunities once you qualify compared to tax. Not that the opportunities are not great for tax as well, but they are definitely quite focussed and specialised, and so if tax isn't your thing it can be a bit of work to move out of it (but not impossible). If you ultimately realise tax isn't your calling, moving to industry after you qualify is your best bet, as you can avail of opportunities to move laterally within your organisation.

Finally tax is not at all mathsy. The extent of maths is adding or multiplying. Its about interpreting complex legislation and applying and communicating that knowledge, so skills around English would be far more important than Maths. The CTA exams are very hard, not going to lie - quite a bit harder than ACA. But they are doable, and you shouldn't let the difficulty of the exams put you off.