Accountants add two hours, extra skills to national CPA exam

The forthcoming revamp of the Uniform CPA Examination will make it “current, relevant, reliable, and legally defensible,” says an April 4 press release by the American Institute of CPAs.

The changes being made include: increasing the testing time by two hours, implementing additional task-based simulations, and adding assessment of cognitive skills, such as critical thinking and and problem solving ability. The exam’s four sections—Auditing and Attestation (AUD), Business Environment and Concepts (BEC), Financial Accounting and Reporting (FAR) and Regulation (REG)—will not change.

The revised test represents a methodological shift by the AICPA due to concerns that previous exams did not simulate enough situations CPAs would have to face on a daily basis, according to an April 5 article in Accounting Today.

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