

Interesting question, it's
fair to say that articleship is the most important phase in the journey of the
CA course. The chartered accountancy course requires the students to complete 3
years of practical training which is actually only 2.5 years because of the
exam leaves that you get. Now, I can't emphasize enough on the importance of
those 2.5 years because those years are going to shape you up to be the
professional that you are going to become in the real world. You'll learn a ton
of new work and make a lot of contacts in your professional field. You'll
definitely make new friends and most probably they are going to be your friends
for life. Also, the CA community is huge, and post-qualification you get to meet
a lot of peers and professional/ experts depending of your articleship
experience and area of work.
Now coming to your main query,
What work is done in CA articleship?
This my friend, squarely depends on 2 factors:
1. Tier of the CA firm where you work i.e. Top
50 CA firms, Mid-sized firms, or Small/ Proprietary firms.
2. Year of your training
period i.e. whether you are in the first year or second year or third year of
your articleship training.
Top 50 CA firms have almost all kinds of
assignments under their bag. Be it statutory audits, central statutory audits
of banks, tax representations, tax consultancy, ROC compliances, due diligence,
investigation or forensic audits, etc. and the list is endless.
However, even though they
do have this much variety of work with them, articled assistants are involved
only in auditing and tax advisory matters. Other assignments are always handled
by the professionals and other experts within the firm. Also, there is very
little scope for switching departments as you have to choose between auditing
and taxation right when you join your articleship and you need to continue in
that field for the next 3 years. The advantage in joining the top 50s is that
you get the feel for corporate culture and advanced level of work experience in
that field since the top 500 listed companies are clients of these CA firms.
The mid-sized firms are
places where you learn almost everything that you have in the CA curriculum.
Audits- Check; Taxation
matters- Check; ROC compliances- Check; Preparation of Financial Statements-
Check; if you are lucky enough, you may also get to work on due diligence
assignments.
Most of the students who want to start their own
practice post qualification try to join mid-sized or small CA firms since the
exposure and the clientele is vast and covers almost all the areas where a CA can
provide professional services.
The next thing, is the year of your practical training, so in the first
year of your articleship you get basic work (which is quite obvious since
you've just landed in the arena of beasts :p) like vouching, testing journal
entries, compiling audit files and documentation, filling ITR forms, visiting
tax departments for submission of documents, GST returns, etc. For the second
year, it's a level up and you start getting technical jobs like tax audits,
bank audit assistants, stock audit assignments, walk-through and risk
assessments, filing income tax returns, and other miscellaneous work. In the
third year, you are considered at par with a CA fresher (in terms of work
skill) and now you'll get assigned to top-notch professional work areas like
finalization of financial statements, due diligence assistant, assisting in tax
representation matters, assisting in central statutory audits of banks and
financial institutions, consultancy assignments, etc. No need to mention the
importance of responsibility that comes with such assignments and the expertise
you acquire during the 3rd year of training.
I dare not make any comparison among the 3 years since every year
is equally important but in my personal experience, I enjoyed the 2nd and the
3rd year because of the thrill and the big assignments.
Apart from all that, you also get
to attend a lot of seminars and training programs organized by various
professional bodies and the ICAI, there is a lot to learn during such courses
as well. I went for seminars and training courses for GST, IND AS, and other
need-based training. Your seniors and your principal are also going to be a
great source of learning, especially your seniors, they give you a lot of
articleship hacks, be it MS excel, time management, and sometimes even stock
trading tips XD.
I mean, if I start sharing my personal experience, this answer is going
to run into pages, so I need to leave some element of surprise and not spoil
your actual experience.
Articleship is nothing to be
nervous about, it's fun in its own way and at the same time, it makes you a
responsible and versatile professional that is needed in the modern-day world.
Don't stress about your stipend too much because post qualification you will be
paid decently well and it'll be all worth it.
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Wouldn't it be a good idea to create a course?