ACA training agreement FAQs

No. You cannot use the designatory letters ACA after your name until you are admitted to membership as an ICAEW Chartered Accountant. ICAEW treats any inappropriate use of the ACA designation as a serious offence.

An ACA training agreement is a formal, written agreement between a student and an employer that is specific to your ACA training. It outlines the support you will receive from your employer while you study and what is expected from you in return.

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Most ACA students will have a minimum of a three-year training agreement to achieve the 450 days of work experience required. However, some students may be eligible to reduce the length of their training agreement by applying for credit for prior work experience.

• Credit for prior work experience

A training agreement cannot be longer than five years, unless the student is training under a strategic degree or other programme offered in partnership with an ICAEW Partner in Learning.

We encourage students to stay with their employer for the duration of their training agreement where possible.

If you change employer part way through your training, your new employer must be registered as an ICAEW authorised training employer (ATE) or principal and you will need to reregister as a student.

• Find out how to reregister

You cannot apply for ICAEW membership until you have fully completed all elements of your ACA training agreement and have had your training file signed off by your employer and verified by ICAEW.

We encourage students to stay with their employer for the duration of their training agreement where possible.

If this is not possible then you will be required to re-register into another training agreement to complete the remaining time.

Please be advised that if this is under three months then you will be required to register for a minimum of three months and obtain at least 65 practical work experience days.

If you change employer before the end of your agreement, you must make sure that you have all of your training records signed off by that employer before you leave – to ensure you do not lose any experience and time you have already accumulated.

So as not to lose any time or work experience that you have gained so far, you must ensure that your online training file is up to date and all entries have been confirmed by your employer before they cancel the training agreement.

Please be advised that your work experience entries need to be recorded until the date the training agreement is cancelled. Your employer will need to send ICAEW your training agreement cancellation form to us within four weeks of your departure. It is your responsibility to ensure they have done this.

Your new employer will need to submit your student re-registration form to ICAEW within four weeks of your arrival. It is your responsibility to ensure this happens.

Yes. To ensure you do not lose any time or work experience accumulated to date, you will need to ensure before you leave that your employer has confirmed/provided feedback for all entries on your online training file.

Remember your new employer cannot sign off any work experience you gained while you were working at your previous employer, so you must get everything signed before you leave. You should therefore always make sure that your records are accurate and up to date before you consider moving to a new employer.

Your employer will need to send ICAEW your training agreement cancellation form within four weeks of your departure date. Your new employer will need to send ICAEW your student re-registration form within four weeks of your start date. It is your responsibility to ensure your relevant employers have done this.

Your new employer can only sign off development and ethical behaviour evidenced by them ie, at your new place of work. So you will need to complete all the Professional Development Ladders and the ethics learning programme requirements with your new employer. But remember, you are not losing development; you just have to demonstrate it to your new employer. If you have the skills, then you should quickly be able to demonstrate them, so it should not delay the completion.

ICAEW regulations state that the Case Study exam cannot be sat until you are in the final 12 months of a training agreement. However, students can have completed their training agreement before sitting the Case Study. So, in this case, you do not need to extend your training agreement.

If you have not completed your practical work experience (PWE) within your training agreement, you would need to extend the agreement to ensure you accumulated enough PWE to meet requirements.

No. If you have completed your training agreement, you do not have to extend your agreement to complete the exams.

No, you will be unable to submit your training file for final approval until your training agreement end date.

If you reach the required 450 days of work experience before the end of your training agreement, you must keep logging any more days in your online training file until the very last date of your training agreement.

You will need to prove to ICAEW that you have successfully completed all the required components of the ACA.

• ICAEW will have records of your exam history and will be aware of when you have successfully completed all the relevant exams.
  
  
• Please complete all tabs of your online training file and ensure it has been signed off by your employer (along with the Audit Qualification tab – if applicable)
  
  
• It is your responsibility to ensure your employer has submitted your records to ICAEW for verification.

You have a 12-month eligibility window to join ICAEW. This date starts from your training agreement end date or the date you received the results for your final ACA exam (whichever is the latter). During these 12 months you will need to submit your training file for verification, allow time for any queries (which in peak times can be up to 12 weeks), get your file verified, apply for membership and join into ICAEW membership.

You can access your training file by going to your dashboard, there will be a link which takes you to the training file. Alternatively, you can access the training file at www.icaew.com/trainingfile.

Please call/email the student support team and request the manual forms to complete your training file.

This will usually mean that you have not recorded work experience until the end date of your training agreement. Please be advised that if you have re-registered into a new agreement midway through your training make sure that you have recorded up until the previous agreement was cancelled as well.