Qualified Accountants Earn 43.5% More Than Part Qualified
Robert Half’s 2026 UK guide puts a part qualified management accountant at a £36,750 median and a qualified management accountant at £52,750. That is a £16,000 gap, a 43.5% uplift, on the same person finishing the same exams. The identical spread applies to financial accountants.
No other step on the finance ladder moves that much in percentage terms. It is the single biggest budget decision in a London finance hire, and most employers meet it by accident when a part qualified hire passes their finals and asks for a review.
Where the jump sits on the ladder
| Stage | Median | Gap to next stage |
|---|---|---|
| Entry level Accounts Assistant, London | £30,000 | - |
| Graduate Accounts Assistant, London | £33,500 | £3,500 |
| Part qualified Management Accountant, UK | £36,750 | £3,250 |
| Qualified Management Accountant, UK | £52,750 | £16,000 |
| Finance Manager, London | £81,000 | £28,250 |
| Financial Controller, London | £95,250 | £14,250 |
London figures come from Robert Half’s live London pages, with the Financial Controller band updated for 2027 at £85,000 to £109,750. The part qualified and qualified rows are UK medians from the 2026 guide, whose fieldwork ran in mid 2025. Treat those two as the national shape of the gap rather than a London figure, because no published source breaks the qualification premium out by region.
Robert Half ranks the certifications employers ask for in this order: ACA, then ACCA and CIMA, then AAT, then CTA.
Why the premium keeps holding
Supply is the answer, and the data is better than it was.
The Financial Reporting Council’s Key Facts and Trends report, published on 5 October 2026, showed UK and Republic of Ireland student numbers rising between 2024 and 2025 for the first time in several years, with membership up 2.5%.
| Body | Student numbers, 2024 to 2025 |
|---|---|
| ACCA | +0.5% |
| ICAS | +0.3% |
| ICAEW | −1% |
| CAI | −1% |
| CIMA | −3.4% |
One year of stabilisation does not reverse a decade. LSE Business Review reported in August 2026 that over ten years ICAEW gained around 12,700 students while CIMA lost around 17,400 and ACCA around 9,500, leaving the three largest bodies down roughly 14,200 students in total, about 9%. CIMA alone fell from around 54,700 students in 2014 to 37,200 in 2024.
That shortfall is now visible at every hiring desk. Hays found 92% of accountancy and finance employers faced skills shortages in the twelve months to January 2026, with 49% reporting moderate or severe AI skills shortages specifically. Robert Half describes a worsening shortage of qualified accountants, reports 45% of businesses planning to grow finance teams, and finds 67% of finance hiring managers will pay more when talent is scarce. Accountancy and finance salaries rose 3.4% in 2026 against a 2.2% all sector average (Hays, 2026).
Two shortages are stacking. One is qualification. The other is AI capability, and the shift generative AI is driving across professional roles has arrived faster in finance than the training pipeline has adjusted to it.
The route employers are taking instead
ICAEW expects mid tier firms to hire more school leavers and fewer graduates, and links that shift directly to employer National Insurance rises, Level 7 apprenticeship funding changes and employment rights legislation. The cost of a graduate intake went up, so the intake moved earlier.
For an employer rather than a practice, the same logic produces a build or buy decision.
Buy. Hire qualified at £52,750 as a national median, higher in London, into a market where 67% of hiring managers will outbid you when they need to.
Build. Hire part qualified or AAT studying at around £36,750, fund the study, and carry the £16,000 premium only when the person qualifies, by which point they have two or three years of your ledger and your systems behind them.
The £16,000 annual premium is the number study support is measured against. We found no published UK benchmark for employer study support cost per student, so price that side from your own provider quotes rather than from any market figure quoted at you. What the comparison does show is that the premium is annual and recurring while the study cost is finite, which is why building usually wins on a four year view and loses on a twelve month one.
Building only works if the person stays, and holding on to younger managers as they qualify is a different exercise from holding on to anyone else. The qualification is portable. The reason to stay has to be something else.
Retention is where the premium gets paid or lost
Robert Half’s 2026 findings contain a useful tension. 68% of UK professionals say their salary rose the last time they changed employer. At the same time, 61% believe staying with their current employer offers greater salary potential in 2026.
Both can be true, and the gap between them is where a newly qualified accountant sits in month one after passing. They know the market pays more for the move. They also believe loyalty should pay. Whichever belief you confirm in that conversation decides whether you keep them.
Three things make the stay credible.
Benchmark before they ask. Move the salary on qualification without a negotiation. A review triggered by a resignation reads as a counter offer regardless of the number attached.
Show the next step, with figures. Finance Manager sits at an £81,000 London median and Financial Controller at £95,250, with Robert Half’s London Financial Controller band updated for 2027 at £85,000 to £109,750. A newly qualified accountant who can see that ladder inside your business behaves differently from one who can only see it on a job board.
Widen the role rather than only the salary. Robert Half ranks financial reporting, data analytics, budgeting and forecasting, and generative AI use as the most sought skills in finance. The premium on people who can cover more than one function is real in finance teams of ten or fewer, where breadth is worth more than depth.
The relationship side of a finance hire carries more weight at this exact point than at any other in a finance career, because the decision to stay is being made on something other than the ledger.
What to specify in the brief either way
Xero is the dividing line in London finance support hiring. 2026 Robert Half London postings listed Xero experience as essential for an accounts assistant and bookkeeper role at £35,000 to £40,000, and familiarity with Xero for an accounts assistant at £33,000 to £36,000. Confident Excel was named on an assistant accountant role at £30,000 to £34,000. One North West London posting asked for someone comfortable using AI tools.
We found no 2026 London postings naming Sage, NetSuite, SAP, Oracle or QuickBooks with usable frequency data, so name the system your finance function actually runs rather than inferring it from the market.
Search by function, not by title. London postings in 2026 used Finance Assistant, Finance and Operations Assistant, Purchase Ledger Clerk, Sales Ledger or Billings Clerk, Credit Controller, Transactional Finance Manager, Finance Business Partner, Head of Finance and Bookkeeper for work that overlaps heavily. For short term cover while a search runs, interim accounts assistants in the City were advertised at £18 to £21 an hour in 2026.
Morgan Spencer’s accountancy and finance recruitment covers part qualified through to Group Financial Controller across London, on permanent, fixed term and interim terms, with every offer benchmarked against live London data before it goes out.
Frequently asked questions
How much more do qualified accountants earn than part qualified?
Robert Half’s 2026 UK guide shows a part qualified management accountant median of £36,750 against £52,750 once qualified. That is a £16,000 gap and a 43.5% uplift. The same spread applies to financial accountants. Both are UK medians rather than London figures.
Is it cheaper to train an accountant or hire one qualified?
On a four year view, usually to train. The £16,000 qualification premium is annual and recurring while study cost is finite. No published UK benchmark exists for employer study support cost per student, so price that from provider quotes. On a twelve month view, hiring qualified is cheaper.
Which accountancy qualification do employers ask for most?
Robert Half’s 2026 guide ranks the certifications in this order: ACA first, then ACCA and CIMA, then AAT, then CTA. No 2025 or 2026 source quantifies a reliable salary premium between ACA and ACCA or CIMA, so treat any figure quoted for that comparison with caution.
Is there still a shortage of qualified accountants?
Yes, though the pipeline is stabilising. Hays found 92% of accountancy and finance employers faced skills shortages in the year to January 2026. The FRC’s October 2026 report shows student numbers rising again, but CIMA fell 3.4% year on year and the three largest bodies are down around 9% across a decade.
What does an Accounts Assistant progress to in London?
The London route runs accounts assistant at a £33,500 graduate median, part qualified management accountant at £36,750, qualified at £52,750, Finance Manager at an £81,000 London median and Financial Controller at £95,250, with Robert Half’s London Financial Controller band updated for 2027 at £85,000 to £109,750.
How do you keep a newly qualified accountant?
Move the salary on qualification before it is asked for, because a review triggered by a resignation reads as a counter offer. Robert Half found 68% of UK professionals say their salary rose the last time they changed employer, while 61% believe staying offers greater salary potential in 2026.
About the author
Julie Jones is Permanent Division Director at Morgan Spencer and a London recruitment specialist with more than 25 years of experience recruiting Personal Assistants, Executive Assistants, Office Managers and business support professionals.
Julie advises organisations across London on permanent recruitment strategy, salary benchmarking, workforce planning and executive support hiring. Her extensive market knowledge helps businesses attract and retain exceptional PA and EA talent in a competitive recruitment market.
