The Help Center

A bookkeeper, or bookkeeping clerk, is someone who is responsible for balancing all of the transactions in their company’s general ledger. This role does not require any type of certification or tertiary education. Although they only need to have a high school certification, it can help their marketability to have some sort of qualification to their name.

An accountant is someone who has received a Bachelor’s degree or higher in either Accountancy or a similar field. Accountants are not necessarily certified, so while all CPAs, Chartered Accountants (CAs) and similarly licensed professionals are accounts, not all accountants are CAs. Here, we will be describing the role of a non-licensed accountant. Similar to a bookkeeper, they are also responsible for balancing financial accounts. However, the scope of their work is broader than a bookkeeper. As such, they cannot work for any public company. However, due to their level of education, they have a broader role in the financial running and auditing of the company.

A Certified Public Accountant (CPA) is someone who has not only acquired an Accountancy degree, but has also undergone all of the extra requirements to earn their CPA license. This entailed meeting the 150 College Credit requirement, the state board’s work requirement, writing the AICPA Ethics Exam if necessary and passing all four parts of the Uniform CPA Exam. Once this is done, they will receive their CPA license from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA.) This license is state specific.