South Carolina - Become a CPA

The road to becoming a CPA in South Carolina starts with the right education (an (AB) Associate of Business in Accounting, then a (BBA) Bachelor of Business in Accounting), and continues with passing the Uniform CPA Examination, gaining practical experience and becoming licensed. Learning never stops – CPAs must accrue continuing professional education credits each year.

Education Requirements

You must attend a college meeting the standards of the South Carolina Board of Accountancy for the board to accept your educational requirements. Your academic advisor will confirm that your school meets the accreditation standards. You will need a total of 150 semester hours to become a CPA, but you can take the CPA exam if you have at least 120 semester hours. Students must have at least 36 hours in accounting coursework, including:

• • Auditing

  • Taxation

  • Financial accounting

  • Managerial or cost accounting

They must also have at least 36 hours of business coursework, which may include:

• • Business law

  • Computer science

  • Corporate finance

  • Economics

  • Ethics

  • Finance

  • Management

  • Marketing

  • Statistics

1. Residency requirements

Unlike many other states, South Carolina does not require that someone licensed as a CPA is a state resident. Only those who hold Social Security numbers and are lawful residents of the United States may become CPAs in South Carolina.

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Exam Requirements

Once a person has accumulated at least 120 semester hours and has a baccalaureate degree, they may sit for the Uniform CPA Examination in South Carolina. It is recommended, however, that applicants have another 30 hours of post-graduate work before taking the exam. That 150 semester hours of education is necessary for licensure in South Carolina, but not for taking the CPA exam.

Fill out the CPA exam application and send it along with your official transcripts and fees to:

CPA Examination Services–SC

P.O. Box 198469

Nashville, TN 37219

1. Exam scheduling

Once your application is accepted, you will receive a Notice to Schedule (NTS) via the way you indicated in the application: Email, fax or regular mail. The NTS allows you six months in which to sit for one or more of the four sections of the Uniform CPA Examination. There are five CPA exam testing centers in South Carolina. They are in:

• • Charleston

  • Columbia

  • Greenville

  • Florence

  • Rock Hill

Schedule your exam online via Prometric, which oversees South Carolina testing centers. Arrive at the testing center at least half an hour prior to the starting time. While you can take any of the four sections of the exam – financial accounting and reporting, auditing and attestation, business environment and concepts and regulation - in any order, you must wait at least two months to retake the same section. You will receive your test results in the mail.

If you do decide to retake a section of the exam, you must submit applicable fees for the exam and registration. Any candidate may take each section of the CPA exam once during a testing window. Dates for each window are:

• • January 1 through February 29

  • April 1 through May 31

  • July 1 through August 31

  • October 1 through November 30

As you can see, testing is not conducted in March, June, September or December.

2. Professional ethics course

Before you can begin your practical work experience, you must pass “Professional Ethics: The AICPA’s Comprehensive Course,” which is available for home study. You must receive a score of at least 90 percent on this ethics test. When you apply for your license, you must attach a copy of the completion certificate to the application.

Experience Needed

Once you have passed the CPA exam, you can begin the experience portion necessary to qualify for licensure. In South Carolina, you can gain experience in one of two ways. You must undergo 2,000 hours of experience over the course of one year working in private industry, academia or public accounting. While you may work fulltime or parttime, you cannot work in accounting for more than 40 hours per week. All your experience requires licensed CPA supervision.

The other method of gaining experience lasts for five years and consists of teaching accounting in an accredited South Carolina college or university. Only accounting courses qualify toward this experience, not related business or finance courses. You cannot teach fundamental accounting courses for more than two of the five years. Those courses considered beyond the fundamental level include income tax, advanced accounting, intermediate accounting, auditing, financial accounting, management accounting and cost accounting.

The Certificate of Experience package, available to download, is needed for documentation of your experience. When filling it out, include all dates of employment, your duties and their description. Your supervising CPAs must sign off on this document.

Licensure Requirements in South Carolina

Once your education is complete, your examination passed, and your experience accepted, you are ready to apply for your South Carolina CPA license. You can apply through the Licensing Application After Exam. Send your completed application and a copy of your completion of the ethics course to:

South Carolina Board of Accountancy

P.O. Box 11329

Columbia, SC 29211-1369.

1. Reciprocal licensing

If you are already licensed as a CPA in another state, you may apply for a reciprocal license as long as your state’s licensing criteria, as per the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy (NASBA), is equivalent to those of South Carolina. Currently, only the U.S. Virgin Islands of all U.S. states and territories is not considered equivalent to those of South Carolina. You must have a minimum of four years out of the last 10 years of professional CPA experience, along with completing at least 80 hours of Continuing Professional Education within the past two years. File an Interstate Exchange of Information form verifying your license and continuing education credits along with the South Carolina reciprocity application. Send the information and applicable fees to the South Carolina Board of Accountancy.

Continuing Professional Education Requirements

CPAs licensed in South Carolina must complete 40 semester hours of Continuing Professional Education (CPE) requirements annually. New CPAs do not have to complete CPE for their first year of licensure. You may carry over a maximum of 20 semester hours from one year to the next. While CPE self-study may account for up to 20 hours of your annual credits, you cannot carry over any self-study hours. One semester hour of a college credit course equals 15 hours of CPE, but one semester hour of a college non-credit course equals just one hour of CPE. Teaching or lecturing may account for up to 20 semester hours per year, but basic accounting or introductory courses do not count. Book or article publishing may account for up to 10 CPE hours annually. You cannot earn more than 10 CPE hours in any one day.

Up to eight of these 40 semester hours may relate to personal development skills, including interviewing, communication, counseling, career planning and management.

Approved program formats for CPE hours include professional development programs and technical sessions for local, state and national accounting organizations. Organized, formal programs offered by your firm also qualify for CPE hours, as do courses offered by colleges and universities and registered NASBA self-study courses.

Report your annual CPE hours each year at the time of license renewal on South Carolina’s CPE reporting form.

It is important to keep CPE records for at least five years. The records you keep must include the course location, name and address of the course sponsor, attendance dates, title and description of course, number of hours and any completion certificates.

The first as well as essential step in becoming a certified public accountant is to take the appropriate CPA assessments. There are a couple of evaluations readily available for those interested in seeking this occupation, but the initial step is to take the ideal tests.

Accountants are in charge of conducting economic as well as company audits, in addition to maintaining and also updating accounting records. They are also typically used in getting in touch with firms, federal government firms, universities, banks, or the private market.

There are a couple of demands in order to work in the exclusive industry, which include working experience, education and learning, and also licensing. Functioning experience is the only official education required. It is recommended that accountants have worked in some type of monitoring placement or have actually obtained their certification within five years of completing their accounting education.

Those with 5 years of accounting education can request a permit to operate in a range of fields, consisting of auditing, personal equity, or tax prep work solutions. This consists of 2 years of customized accounting courses, plus one year of accounting electives. On top of that, their licenses will be called for to examine specific types of companies, such as hedge funds, personal equity companies, retail financial companies, and also property investment companies.

For tax obligation prep work solutions, there are 2 degrees of licenses readily available. One license is designed for accountants who operate in private industry. The 2nd level of certificate is designed for accountants who work in tax obligation prep work business.

After obtaining their licenses, accountants need to proceed their education and learning in order to end up being a certified public accountant. These programs can be either in a classroom setting, or online. Programs in a class consist of training courses like Accounting Approaches, Auditing, and also Public Administration; or accounting approaches, financial, and also public administration.

Programs in financing and accounting focus on monetary accounting, general accounting, and also business monitoring. For public accounting, the course includes public accounting accreditation, auditing, or audit preparation training courses. The 3 needs are incorporated to create the CPA test.

A permit will certainly be issued in any type of state where the demand is satisfied. On top of that, each state has certain steps in order to obtain your license. The two most important actions are to pass the initial examination and also to preserve it throughout your career.

There are particular actions in order to keep your certificate. First, all state boards of accountancy need you to take the nationwide assessment which is provided twice a year. In addition, you must pass a state test if the board of accountancy in your state requires it.

In order to maintain your certificate, you need to efficiently complete the first examination a minimum of once each year. You have to after that invest five years to pass the 2nd exam.

There are likewise specific online examinations offered. Some are offered by financial institutes, while others are given by the state boards. To get more information regarding how to come to be a certified public accountant, you can see the website of the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy.

Via the necessary actions, people can locate the course they want to absorb their occupation. Accreditation is a good way to see to it that the CPA license is current.

Federal and state regulations need Certified public accountants to preserve self-reliance when executing audits and likewise assessments. While inquiring from at Enron, Arthur Andersen Certified public accountants did not maintain independence and also accomplished both connecting with solutions as well as bookkeeping options, which damages the CPA code of concepts. The APCIA asks that all Certified Public Accountant designation owners comply with the Code of Specialist Conduct, which lays out the honest criteria CPAs require to follow.

Auditing needs for local, state, as well as federal governments, personal companies, in addition to nonprofits. Relabelled countless times for many years, the organization has actually been described as the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) because 1957 along with additionally supplies Certified Public Accountant accreditation exams. The preliminary Certified public accountants got licenses in 1896. In 1934 the Supplies as well as Exchange Settlement (SEC) called for all openly traded companies to submit routine economic records backed by individuals of the accountancy industry.

The audit market grew in the late 1990s as a result of huge bookkeeping firms broadening their remedies to consist of various kinds of consulting. The Enron detraction in 2001 triggered considerable modifications in the audit industry, including the fact that Arthur Andersen, among the nation's leading accountancy companies, headed out of business.