Introductory Financial Accounting module (BU11001)

Accountants prepare, use and communicate information, and allow others to make critical business decisions. Some of that information will be used for internal business decision-making (management and financial accounting information). Others will use it to make decisions external to the business (financial accounting information only).

As such, accountants must understand how basic accounting information is compiled. This module focuses on financial accounting information. For students not following the Accountancy pathway, this module will give you an understanding of the role of Accountant and of basic Accountancy to help you in your career.

What you will learn

In this module, you will :

• consider the wider issues of accountability in our everyday lives
• investigate accountability within a business context by identifying the users of financial accounting statements and establishing some fundamental accounting concepts

By the end of the module, you will:

• know how to account for both cash and non-cash transactions
• be able to prepare financial statements of a sole trader and a partnership (Statement of Financial Position and the Statement of Profit/Loss)
• understand how financial statements are prepared for a business entity that has incomplete accounting records

Assignments / assessment

Online assessment (20%)

• Multiple-choice assessment will be based on the materials delivered in weeks 1-5
• The test will be given in week 7

Written exam (80%)

• This assessment is a closed-book exam based on the materials delivered in weeks 1-10
• This exam will be delivered at the end of the module

Teaching methods / timetable

Each week you should expect two lectures and two tutorials per week, around 4 hours in total. All teaching materials will be made available before the classes, and you will be expected to attempt some examples before each tutorial.

You should expect around 12-15 hours of independent study per week for this module to complete all of the reading, pre class work and assessment tasks.

There are 9 weeks of teaching. For this module, the exact dates of teaching and/or reading weeks are to be confirmed.