IAESB Proposes Revised Standards for Aspiring Accountants

The International Accounting Education Standards Board (IAESB) released a set of clarified standards and revisions governing the practical experience requirements for aspiring accountants on July 8.

The IAESB released the new standards as a proposed revision (PDF) of International Education Standard (IES) 5, Practical Experience Requirements. The revision to IES 5 — which currently prescribes the practical experience that International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) member bodies should require before qualification as a professional accountant — proposes greater flexibility in measuring practical experience, permits supervisors or mentors to direct an aspiring accountant’s experience and requires experience to be recorded in a verifiable and consistent form.

“The IAESB believes that relevant practical experience is at the heart of the development of competence of a professional accountant,” IAESB chairman Mark Allison said in a statement. “This revision of IES 5 reflects the different ways that experience can be gained, and is a significant step from a rules-based approach to a system based on principles.”

IFAC member bodies will be required to demonstrate that the method of gaining experience follows an input-based or output-based approach or a combination of both approaches.

The IAESB has undertaken the project of redrafting all eight of its IESs in accordance with its new clarity drafting conventions. It has proposed revisions to:

• IES 7, Continuing Professional Development: A Program of Lifelong Learning and Continuing Development of Professional Competence
• IES 4, Professional Values, Ethics, and Attitudes
• IES 6, Assessment of Professional Competence
• IES 1, Entry Requirements to a Program of Professional Accounting Education

Comments are due Oct. 8.