The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) has agreed to credit the ICAI Qualification with Five exemptions towards the Professional Accountancy stage of the ICAEW Qualification. The Professional stage comprises of six papers including devolved assessments in Company Law and Commercial Law. Exemption to ICAI members will be in Accounting; Audit and Assurance; Business finance; Financial reporting; Taxation, says a Press Release issued by the ICAI.

The Professional stage is flexible and can be taken within or outside a training contract. Objective of the Professional stage is to confirm that the students have a professional knowledge and understanding of the basic skills to start a career in any of the main stream of accountancy in public practice, commercial organisations and the public sector of the economy. A candidate is eligible for Professional Accountancy Certificate (PAC) of ICAEW after passing the professional stage. Subsequently the candidates shall appear in the Advanced Stage, which is the final assessment on the route to ACA qualification of ICAEW.

This has been undertaken in terms of the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) and the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), in April 2001.

It may be mentioned that the ICAI is a statutory body established under the Chartered Accountants Act 1949 for development and regulation of the profession of Chartered Accountants in India with about 1,05,000 members and the ICAEW has been incorporated by Royal Charter granted by Queen Victoria in May, 1880 and is the largest accounting body in Europe having more than 1,19,000 members.