Delivering apprenticeships in England

Apprenticeships are a great way for your students to get hands-on experience and learn the tricks of the trade, and it’s no different for accountancy. Accounting apprenticeships are a perfect study route to help people develop new, enhanced and industry-relevant skills.

We're seeing more employers using apprenticeships as a way to develop and enhance their existing workforce or to attract new staff, so an apprenticeship is a viable career path and a great alternative to university.

Offering apprenticeships is also a great way to support and upskill individuals within your local community. And in England, the apprenticeship levy and government support available is all in place to help with funding.

While there's no requirement for qualifications within the Level 3 and Level 4 apprenticeships, AAT’s Level 3 Diploma in Accounting and Level 4 Diploma in Professional Accounting qualifications are the perfect answer to some of the knowledge and skills requirements. Undertaking the qualification clearly sets out progression milestones for the apprentices, based around the unit assessments.

We are also an End Point Assessment Organisation (EPAO) for the Level 2 Accounts/Finance Assistant apprenticeship, for which the Level 2 Certificate in Accounting qualification is a requirement. 

The behaviour and skills elements of the on-programme learning will be developed through workplace learning, and will reinforce the knowledge elements gained through the AAT accounting qualification units.

As the apprentice works their way towards the end of the on-programme learning you’d need to work with the employer to sign off the apprentice as ready to go through the gateway.

The gateway is the point at which an employer, with the support of the training provider, decides if the apprentice has developed the skills, knowledge and behaviours to take the EPA. Once the employer has signed this off, the training provider can schedule the individual components of the EPA.