ICAI Exam (CA Examination)

You must have heard about Chartered Accountancy or CA no matter where you are. CA is the holy grail of accounting in India. Please note that the CA exam discussed here is different from the CPA exam CPA ExamA Certified Public Accountant (CPA) is a US state board-issued license to practice the accounting professionread more. Now to make you believe what the CA exam is all about, let us look at some evidence of its reputation: –

Among all students who attempt the ICAI exam, only 3%-8% clear inter and final levels.

  • The ICAI, a prestigious institute, currently has many students, i.e., 1,175,000.The CA exam offered by ICAI has been ranked no. 2 worldwide.As per the statistics of April 2015, the total numbers of CA are 239,974. Out of which 124,434 CA professionals are employed with organizations, and 115,540 are practicing CA.The ICAI is an institute that has been delivering CA since 1949, which means the ICAI exam has 67 years of a long history of producing one of the most employable professionals in the world.These numbers did not come out of the blue. They were created. And if you are one of the CA aspirants, you need to put your heart and soul into this CA exam to be counted among them. Are you interested? Know everything about the ICAI exam in this article. We will talk about the nuts and bolts of the CA exam in detail.

Hint – This article will take some time to read and deals with great information out there. Grab a pen and paper if you feel like noting them down.

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About CA Exam

CA is the holy grail of accounting in India. The students who have a commerce background are ideal for CAs. Rather most students enroll for the CA exam when they pass out from 10+2. But there is also a direct route to do CA. It would be best if you were a graduate to appear for the exam. Before enrolling, remember that it is not for the faint-hearted. You need to put hard work into this ICAI Exam course.

  • Roles: Accountant, Auditor, Internal Auditor, Financial Reporter, SAP FICO Consultant, and Tax Consultant.Exam: To pass the ICAI exam, you need to pass through 3 levels. You may need to appear for only two levels if you appear after graduation (subject to the eligibility criteria).ICAI Exam Dates: CA exam final and IPCC are conducted in May and November, whereas CPT is held in June and December every year.The nitty-gritty: There is a lot of nitty-gritty in the CA exam. You need to pass three exam levels and complete 100 hours of Information Technology Training (ITT) and an article-ship of 3 years. To enter into an article-ship, you must at least clear one group of IPCC.Eligibility: You can appear for the CA exam after the 10th standard and enroll for CPT. But if you want to opt after graduation, you need to score 55%; if you are a commerce graduate or a bachelor of other streams, you must score at least 60% in their graduation. You can directly appear for the IPCC exam after graduation (subject to adhering to all the eligibility criteria).

Why Pursue the ICAI Exam?

The CA exam is not a course that everyone should pursue. It is for students willing to invest everything into the CA exam. The candidates must forget about social life, fun, and other areas of life. The focus should be CA if a candidate desires to clear it. If a candidate is willing to crack the code of CA, they should pursue it. But there is good news as well. The hard work will not go in vain.

  • Once a candidate completes CA, they will earn instant credibility. They do not need to flee to companies and stand in a queue. Instead, they can practice themselves as self-employed professionals or join a credible post in an organization.Someone says so well that it is not achieving but becoming that worth. So, when a candidate invests their day and night in pursuing CA, they will clear the ICAI exam and become resilient, persistent, hardworking, and immensely knowledgeable. On a scale of 10 in employability, where all these skills are a must, a candidate should score more than eight if they pursue CA with utter diligence.The CA exam is a comprehensive course. The candidate will learn a lot about many subjects that would be your ally for the rest of your career. For example, they would learn about accounting and learn audit, taxation, financial reporting, and many more. So, every sweat that the candidate drops from their brow would benefit the rest of their career.

Let us have a look at the top 5 companies which employ CA: –

  • Deloitte (based in over 150 countries and employed over 200,000 professionals; the largest professional services network in the world by revenueRevenueRevenue is the amount of money that a business can earn in its normal course of business by selling its goods and services. In the case of the federal government, it refers to the total amount of income generated from taxes, which remains unfiltered from any deductions.read more).PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) (one of the big fourBig FourBig Four refers to the top four accounting firms in the world that audit more than 80% of the US public companies. These firms are Deloitte, Pricewaterhouse Coopers, KPMG, and Ernst & Young. These firms have earned this title because of their huge size, good reputation and the worldwide reach in the field.read more audit companies in the world; second largest professional services network in 2014).Ernst & Young (EY) (one of the big four audit firms and the largest service firm in revenue in 2012).KPMG (employed over 162,000 people and is one of the big four audit firms globally).BDO International (fifth largest accountancy network in the world).

ICAI Exam Format

There are three exam levels if aspirants need the route after standard 10. Let us look at the exam format of each level individually.

CPT (Common Proficiency Test)

  • CPT is an entry-level test in the CA exam. To pass the ICAI exam, you need to clear four subjects divided into two sessions in the first battle.In the first session, you need to appear for the Fundamentals of Accounting and Mercantile Laws.You will appear for General Economics and Quantitative Aptitude in the second session.The knowledge level you require is foundational.There are a total of 200 multiple choice questions you need to answer to clear the CPT exam.To pass CPT, you need to score at least 50%. That means you must score 100 out of 200 to pass the exam.There is no negative marking for not attempting any question. But if given the wrong answer to a question, you will have to pay the penalty of 0.25 marks.

IPCC (Integrated Professional Competence Course)

  • There are some eligibility criteria before you can sit for IPCC. To sit for IPCC, you need to clear CPT plus 10+2, or you should complete your graduation with 55% marks in the commerce stream and 60% in other streams or candidates who have passed the Intermediate level examination in ICSI or ICWA. You also need to complete 100 hours of Information Technology Training (ITT) before you are eligible to opt for the exam. Moreover, you should register for your IPCC exam at least nine months before taking the examination.There are two groups in IPCC. The first group has four subjects, and the second group has three subjects. In the first group, you will attempt Accounting, Law Ethics & Communication, Cost Accounting Cost AccountingCost accounting is a defined stream of managerial accounting used for ascertaining the overall cost of production. It measures, records and analyzes both fixed and variable costs for this purpose.read more & Financial Management, and Taxation (two parts – 1st part: Income Tax and 2nd part: Service Tax & VAT). In the second group, you have to appear for Advanced Accounting, Auditing & Assurance, and Information Technology & Strategic ManagementStrategic ManagementStrategic management in a business refers to the planning, management, utilization of resources to define and achieve objectives efficiently. read more.If you appear for IPCC, you are expected to have working knowledge in each subject.To clear IPCC, you need to score at least 40% in each subject, and your aggregate in all the subjects would be 50%.

Articleship

  • Articleship is the added advantage or requirement of passing the CA exam. Once you complete IPCC, you need to do three years of articleship. The minimum requirement for doing an articleship is to clear at least one IPCC group and complete 100 hours of ITT.Articleship is practical training, and students get paid a stipend every month.

CA Exam Final

  • There are two requirements to be eligible to appear for the CA final exam.The first thing is you need to pass both groups of IPCC.The second thing is you need to complete at least 2.5 years of article-ship before the exam.There are two groups you need to clear to pass the CA final. In each group, there are four subjects. The first group consists of Financial Reporting, Strategic Financial Management, Advanced Auditing & Professional Ethics, and Corporate Laws & Secretarial Practice. In the second group, you will attempt Advanced Management Accounting, Information Systems Control, Direct Taxes, and Indirect TaxesIndirect TaxesIndirect tax, also known as consumption tax, is the type of tax the person does not directly bear. In contrast, the incidence of such taxes is passed on to the end consumer of goods or services by adding such taxes to the value of those goods or services, like Excise duty, Service tax, VAT, etc.read more.You need to have advanced knowledge to clear the CA Final.You need to score at least 40% in each subject and 50% in aggregate to pass the exam.Once you pass the exam, you will enroll as a member of ICAI. As a result, you will get the membership of both ACA (Associate Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India) and FCA (Fellow Member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India).You will also get two certificates once you pass the CA final – the first certificate is the certificate of membership and the second certificate is the certificate of practice.

CA Exam Weights/Breakdown

The breakdown of the ICAI exam at each level is different. Let us see how the weight at each level has been distributed.

CPT (200 Marks)

It has two sessions, as mentioned above. Each session has two sections. In the first session, the first section is Fundamentals of Accounting, which is given 60% weightage, and the second section is Mercantile Laws, which is given 40% weightage. In the second session, the first section is General Economics and the second section is Quantitative Aptitude. Both have been given equal weightage (i.e., 50%).

IPCC

Let us look at the weightage of each group (as you know, IPCC has two groups): –

Group 1 (400 Marks)

  • Accounting (25%)Law Ethics & Communication (25%)Cost Accounting (12.5%) + Financial Management (12.5%)Taxation [Part I: Income Tax (18.75%) + Part II: Service Tax & VAT (6.25%)]

Group 2 (300 Marks)

  • Advanced Accounting (33.33%)Auditing & Assurance (33.33%)Information Technology (16.67%) & Strategic Management (16.67%)

ICAI Exam Final

Let us have a glance at each subject and what weightage is being given to them: –

Each subject has equal weightage (i.e., 25% each).

Group 2 (400 Marks)

Each subject is given a similar weightage (i.e.25% each).

CA Examination Fees

It takes five years to complete the CA exam if you clear the exams in one attempt. First, let us look at the fee structure of the ICAI exam, assuming that you are enrolling for CPT as well.

  • Firstly, you need to enroll for CPT, and you need to pay ₹1,500.Once you qualify for CPT, you need to pay the tuition fees of ₹7,500, which includes registration as an audit clerk (500), a fee for student associations (`500), a registration fee with BoS Knowledge Portal (500), tuition fee for IPCC (4000) and registration fee for 100 hours of ITT (2000).After clearing IPCC, you need to pay ₹8,500 for the last stage of CA exam studies. So in total, you need to spend around ₹17,500 for the whole CA Exam.

ICAI Exam Results & Passing Rates

To know what to expect from your CA examination, you need to know the past trends of results and passing rates. So here we will present you the past five years’ results and success rates to make a concrete decision based on these statisticsStatisticsStatistics is the science behind identifying, collecting, organizing and summarizing, analyzing, interpreting, and finally, presenting such data, either qualitative or quantitative, which helps make better and effective decisions with relevance.read more.

CPT

The passing rates for the last five years are below: –

The passing rates for the last five years are below (both groups): –

CA Exam Final Results

  • Source- The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

CA Exam Study Materials

ICAI provides all the study materials. But that is not enough. You also need to browse through past year’s question papers. So, while studying, get them first. If you can enroll yourself under an experienced teacher who can teach CA, your chance of success will increase.

Strategies to crack the code of CA Exam

Here are a few tips which will help you clear one of the toughest exams in India. Have a look: –

  • No matter what level you are preparing for, you first need to know that you need to give yourself at least six months of intense study before the exam. There should not be any excuse that you do not have six months. If you want to clear the ICAI exam (any level), you need to commit from your core and then go after it.Once you set aside six months for studying all the subjects, it is time to plan how you would learn. Remember, you need to complete at least one walk-through of overall topics and two revisions. To do this, you need to be diligent. Within the first four months, you need to complete the whole walk-through of all the subjects (if you are preparing for CPT, you need to give one month to each subject; if you are going for IPCC, all you have is 17 days per subject; and if you are preparing for the CA final, you have 15 days for each subject).During your first walk-through, make sure that you have at least three days to spare. If you are preparing for the CA final, you need to prepare one subject in 12 days. After another two days, you need to summarize, and on the last day, you should appear for a 3-hours exam to get an idea about your area of improvement.Once you are done with the first walk-through, it is time for the first revision. Let us say you are preparing for the CA final. You need to revise within 45-48 days. That means each subject will get 5-6 days for revision—this time, you need to work on the areas you need to improve.Now you have 10 -12 days left for the exam. You need to give the final revision and sit for the mock test every day during this time.Make sure you decide six months by considering the exam date beforehand. It would help if you took seven days more for contingency. That means if you choose to take six months to prepare for the exam, take 187 days of preparation, leaving seven days for contingency. We advise you to keep this time if any emergency arrives or if you get sick during your preparation time.

That is a comprehensive guide on everything you need to know about the ICAI exam. I hope you did not skip any part and took good notes. Now go and nail the CA exam. Good luck!

This article is a guide to the ICAI exam (CA Exam). Here, we discussed the CA exam, why to pursue it, fees, structure, passing strategies, tips, tricks, etc. You may also have a look at the following articles: –

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