Management accounting

[Marie]

Hi,

I've got an interview tommorow & i'm just doing some prep.

The role is for an Assistant Accountant & mentions getting involved in management accounting.

What exactly is management accounting? I've only worked for a small company & so I'm not entirely sure if what I was calling managment accounts actually is management accounts. I did an all round role & did cashflow reports, input of information to compare estimated project costings against actual. I also compared actual sales etc against estimated.Is any of this basic managment accounts & what is full management accounts.

Thanks anyone who replies.

[Nich]

I Believe Management Accounts is preparing the accounts up to P & L and Balance Sheet.
Someone correct me if i'm wrong?!

[blobbyh]

I Believe Management Accounts is preparing the accounts up to P & L and Balance Sheet.
Someone correct me if i'm wrong?!

This is financial accounting, Nich, and usually based on historical information. My take of management accounting is the preparing of reports and other data for senior company members to enable strategic and tactical decisions to be made in the future.

You can also think of another difference as being financial accounting information is usually produced and made available primarily for external users (e.g. P&L and Balance Sheet etc) whereas management accounting information is usually only available for internal use (e.g. cashflows, forecasts, budgets etc). So yes Marie, you've already "done" management accounting though the difference between basic and full must depend on the size of the company, the complexity/variety of reports required and the technical skill of the data compiler.

[Marie]

Thanks for replying.