eFinancialCareers

Good news: the Big Four accountancy firms are still taking on as many people as last year. Not such good news: the number of applications is swelling and they recruit on a rolling basis, which means you need to apply early to get a place.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) reckons it’s seen applications increase by 50% on this time last year, and KPMG says it’s seen a 20% upswing. Ernst & Young (E&Y) tells us it typically receives 10,000 applications, so competition is clearly pretty fierce in a normal year.

Stephen Isherwood, head of graduate recruitment at E&Y, says: “We’ve seen greater interest during the milkround events we’ve hosted this year. I think competition will be tougher this year, not because we’ve raised our benchmark, but simply because we’re getting more applications per vacancy than previously.”

“People should be applying now,” says Sarah de Carteret, graduate recruitment manager at Deloitte. “We’re getting a greater number of applications much earlier than in previous years and, as we recruit on a rolling basis, there won’t be nearly as many opportunities towards the end of the year.”

Deloitte is taking on around 1,000 grads, E&Y has 500+ places, KPMG 750, and PwC 1,000. Expect around a quarter of these to be in corporate finance and consultancy and the majority to be in audit and tax.

So how do the firms feel about receiving applications from students who would have looked at banking if circumstances were otherwise?

Isherwood tells us: “What we want to see is commitment. Obviously, candidates may have previously looked to investment banks first, but they need to convince us that they have considered their options and they genuinely believe our firm is the best route to take.”

De Carteret thinks that one of the big appeals is job security during these turbulent times: “We’re not the type of industry that makes people redundant en masse, or defers entry to our graduate scheme. There’s also an increased sense of security around having an internationally recognised qualification that is always in demand.”

As mentioned, most positions on the schemes are recruited on a rolling, first-come-first-served basis, but certain divisions have set deadlines as follows.

Deloitte: 31.01.09: consulting
Apply here

E&Y: 18.11.08: consulting and corporate finance
Apply here

PwC: 01.12.08: strategy consulting, 05.12.08: business recovery services, corporate finance, performance improvement consulting, and economic consulting.
Apply here