What is the average salary, hours, vacation days of a CPA?

  • Creator
    Topic
  • #190793
    salena786
    Member

    I would appreciate if anyone can give me an idea of the salary to expect for a CPA and the hours they work? (What type of firm/ location) Also, how many vacation/sick days one receives?

    Thanks!

Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)
  • Author
    Replies
  • #634333
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Your work hours and vacation days are not dependent upon being a CPA, they depend on the company you work for, private versus public, your position in the company, etc. I work 40 hours a week (more at month end) and get 4 weeks of vacation as an accounting manager. My boss, the Controller and a CPA, works about the same amount of hours as I do and gets 4 weeks of vacation also because that is the max amount of vacation our company will allow. You won't get a standard answer here because there are too many variables.

    #634334
    krschneids
    Member

    I'm a first year audit associate at a top 15 public firm in their Milwaukee, Wisconsin office. I make $50K, get 20 combo vacation/sick days, and, depending on the time of year (i.e., busy season or not), I'm working between 40 and 70 hours a week. I have several friends working for Big 4 in the same city, and my salary/benefits are comparable if not slightly better, if that helps.

    AUD 79 (7/14)
    FAR 78 (7/14)
    REG 78 (8/14)
    BEC 81 (10/14)

    #634335
    Tripp11
    Member

    30+ person CPA firm in the Midwest, and we start our people off at $25-$30 per hour and we pay hourly – not salary. You want to make more money? Work more hours. Pretty simple.

    As for the hours we expect new staff to work, we expect them to work roughly 2,200 hours in the year; however, being paid hourly seems to make our staff happy when we have labor intensive projects come in where they might have to work 10+ hours per day for a few weeks in a row.

    Employees until they are here for 4+ years get two weeks of PTO (sick/vacation). Employees here 4+ years get three weeks of PTO.

    AUD - 93
    BEC - 80
    REG - 86
    FAR - 83

    #634336
    Pattar54
    Member

    Small Midwest firm. Low 40's. Vacation benefit is incredible tho. I had 7.5 weeks this past year. It's based on being required to work 60 hours of OT for the year, then every hour of OT after those 60 is hour for hour of PTO. I had my 60 OT requirement before January was done last year. You can roll over the vacation from year to year, or be paid out a couple weeks if you'd like.

    BEC: 77
    REG: 54, 76
    FAR: 54, 84
    AUD: 64, 70, 90!
    I'm done!!

    #634337

    Midwest Firm – Top 10

    Salary – upper 40s

    Vacation/ PTO – starts at 20 (can purchase more if wanted)

    If there was one thing that I wish our firm did, I wish it was the accumulation of PTO time for hours > required OT, kinda like Pattar54 stated. It's incentive for extra time off or a bonus at the end of the year. When a person just makes salary with no extra, the more we work, the less we make (mathmatically).

    BEC - ✔ REG - ✔ AUD - ✔ FAR - ✔

    Becker + NINJA MQCs for FAR

    Licensed January 2015

    #634338
    juuustin
    Member

    Starting big 4 in January (Northeast Metro) so I can't comment on hours worked just yet, but salary is 57K and PTO is 25 days (so five weeks).

    MD Candidate: 10/1/14

    FAR - 87 (11/23/14)
    REG - 87 (1/30/15)
    BEC - 89 (4/19/15)
    AUD - 98 (5/30/15)

    Ethics - 100

    Experience - In Progress!

    #634339
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    If I have learned anything from this forum is that it totally depends on where you live. You should look at salary.com and maybe your chambers of commerce. Take into consideration what type of business you will be in and what your responsibilities will be. Also think of how much work experience you have as a whole. There really is no blanket answer.

    I live in a large metropolitan city and I make more than most anyone here who has posted their salary, but quite a bit. But, that doesn't mean I have more spending power because our cost of living here is very, very high. You're lucky if you can get a rent bill for less than $1,000.

Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)
  • You must be logged in to reply to this topic.