Audit Assistant Review

I thoroughly enjoyed the majority of my work, especially when at a client's site and given responsibilty to interact with the client and work on my own sections. However, audit being audit there are obviously times when you have to do boring work such as calling and casting for long periods or scanning and photocopying.

I felt highly valued throughout the internship and staff were genuinely grateful when I helped them out. The managers and graduate trainees were very friendly and talked openly about their experiences at the firm. However, as expected the feeling of being valued varied depending upon who I was working for and whilst the vast majority of managers and seniors gave me responsibility there were a few who perhaps tried to take advantage by giving menial tasks and little responsibility.

Each intern had a councilling manager and a buddy to help smoothe them into the business. They were very willing to help with any problems I had and helped me to secure work during the first few days and to get to know a few other members of staff. All managers and trainees were very approachable and had no qualms about answering any questions I had.

There was never a shortage of work during the internship but at the same time I wasn't forced to take on work that I couldn't finish. Finding work required asking around to see if there was anything that could be helped with but as everyone was so friendly this was no problem at all and meant that when I needed to time to complete individual research for presentations it was no problem at all.

The level of responsibility given depended upon whether I was on client site or in the office and also which senior/ manager I was working for. On a couple of jobs I was literally thrown in at the deep end and expected to interact with the clients right from the start but given guidance when I needed it. This was great as it really forced me to learn about what I was doing and gave me a good insight into the real working life at the firm. As mentioned above though there were a few occasions when I only had menial tasks to do - this was more frequent when in the office.

I feel that I have learnt a lot from my time at BDO. The skills I learnt included attention to detail; how to interact with clients and never being afraid to ask when I don't understand. These are things I can take into university and my future career. I also learnt a great deal about audit and the firm's culture in particular - it has helped to inform me of my future career choice.

When the graduate trainees were in the office there was a fun atmosphere. However, when they were in college it was not quite the same. If all the interns had been placed in the same department it would have been more fun!

I would say that the internship worked quite well most things were planned before we started including being booked to jobs. However, some interns had a better experience than others because they spent more time at client site or had better shadowing opportunities. It would be fairer if this was more evenly spread.

The first week was spent training, most of which came in useful for our later work. Whenever I didn't understand anything somebody took the time to explain it to me.

I'm not sure yet if I got a job with them but I would be very tempted to take it if I do. The personality and working culture of the firm makes it very appealing.

It took a couple of weeks for the social scene to kick in but once it did there was a very good relationship between the audit and tax interns.

Being in central London it was never going to be cheap!!

Again, its central London!

The audit drinks were very good and the were a few other things planned but unfortunately we didn't get much chance to go on them. For example, there was a big trip to a five-a-side tournament in Birmingham but unfortunately the interns were only given a few days notice so we couldn't really plan to go. If we had been told about it beforehand we would have been able to sort a team.