General Accounting - Fundamentals - Module 1

This course is designed to help people without an accounting background to easily learn and understand accounting concepts.

Upon successful completion of this course, the participant should be able to:

• Understand the principal components of annual accounts (Balance Sheet and Profit and Loss Account) and their purposes

Accounts and how they work
Classification of accounts

• Profit and Loss Account accounts (expenses and income)
• Balance Sheet accounts (assets, liabilities and equity)

The main accounting principles and concepts

• Accounting entity
• Accruals, realisation, revenue recognition
• Consistency
• Cost
• Going concern
• Matching
• Materiality
• Money measurement
• Prudence

The concept of accrued and deferred items
The journal and the ledger
The trial balance
VAT – a brief overview
Adjusting and closing entries

• Finding and adjusting for errors
• "Closing the books"

The standard chart of accounts
The annual accounts

• Legal requirements
• Contents of the Balance Sheet
• Contents of the Profit and Loss Account
• Contents of the Notes to the Accounts
• The directors’/managers’ report
• The auditor’s report
• The allocation of results
• Other information

Approval of accounts
Filing of accounts in the Commercial Register

The course ends with a written exam. Successful completion of the exam is sanctioned by a certificate of success issued by the House of Training and cosigned by the "Ministère de l'Education nationale, de l'Enfance et de la  Jeunesse".