JAMB Syllabus for Principle of Accounts 2024/2025 | PDF Download

The JAMB syllabus for the Principles of Accounts for the academic year 2024/2025 has been recently released. This proactive step by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board is aimed at assisting students in adequately preparing for their upcoming Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).

Objectives of JAMB Syllabus for Principle of Accounts

The JAMB syllabus for the Principles of Accounts is designed to equip candidates for the Board’s examination, assessing their comprehension, knowledge, and proficiency in the following key areas of the subject:

• Stimulating interest in Principles of Accounts.
• Utilizing foundational knowledge and practical skills in Accounting.
• Applying knowledge and interpreting accounting information for effective decision-making.
• Establishing the relevance of accounting information in governmental and business contexts.
• Incorporating information and communication technology to address present and future challenges.
• Implementing current accounting principles in financial reporting.

Topics Under JAMB Principle of Accounts Syllabus

The topics that are covered in the JAMB syllabus for the Principle of Accounts are divided into Eighteen sections.

Nature and Significance of Accounting

• Development of accounting (including branches of accounting)
• Objectives of bookkeeping and accounting.
• Users and characteristics of Accounting information
• Principles, convention, and concepts of accounting (significance, nature, and application)
• The roles of accounting records and information

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Differentiate between bookkeeping and accounting.
• Make use of the historical background of bookkeeping and accounting for future development.
• Application of the right principles, concepts, and conventions to solving accounting problems.
• Determine the role of accounting records and information in decision-making.
• Understand the branches of Accounting such as Cost Accounting, Management Accounting, Auditing, Financial Accounting, and Taxation.

Principles of Double Entry

• Functions of source documents
• Books of original entry
• Accounting equation
• The ledger and its classifications
• Trial balance
• The types and treatment of errors and uses of suspense account

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Compare the various source documents and their uses.
• Understand the source documents to the various books of original entry.
• Determine the effect of changes in elements of the accounting equation.
• Identify the role of double entry and use it to post transactions into various divisions of the ledger.
• Balance off ledger accounts.
• Extract a trial balance from balances and determine its uses.
• Identify various types of errors and their necessary corrections.
• Create a suspense account.

Ethics in Accounting

• Objectives
• Qualities of an Accountant

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Make use of ethics in preparing and presenting Accounting Reports.
• List qualities of an Acco

Cashbook

• Columnar cashbooks
• Discounts
• Petty cashbook and the imprest system

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Determine the cash float.
• Differentiate between two and three-columnar cashbooks and how transactions are recorded in them.
• Differentiate between trade and cash discounts.
• Determine the effects of trade and cash discounts in the books of accounts.
• Identify various petty cash expenses.

Bank Transactions and Reconciliation Statements

• Instrument of bank transactions
• E-banking system
• Courses of discrepancies between cashbook and bank statement
• Bank reconciliation statement

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to :

• Examine bank documents such as cheques, pay-in-slips, credit and debit cards, and their uses.
• Assess the impact of automated credit systems, credit transfers, interbank transfers, and direct debit on cash balances.
• Factors that cause discrepancies between balances of the cashbook and bank statements
• Prepare adjusted cashbook balance.
• Prepare bank reconciliation statements.

The Final Accounts of a Sole Trader

• The Income statement (Trading and profit and loss account)
• Statement of financial position (Balance sheet) Adjustments: Provision for bad and doubtful debt
• Provision for discounts
• Make provision for depreciation using straight-line and reducing balance methods
• Accruals and prepayments

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Identify the cost of sales, gross profit, and net profit of a sole trader.
• Identify fixed assets, current assets, long-term liabilities, current liabilities, and proprietor’s capital.
• Compute adjustable items on the related expenditure and income in the profit and loss account.
• Relate the adjustable items and their corresponding disclosure in the statement of financial position.
• Distinguish between bad debts and provision for bad and doubtful debts.

Stock Valuation

• Means of cost determination using FIFO, LIFO, and simple average
• The advantages and disadvantages of the methods
• The importance of stock valuation

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Identify the cost of materials issued to production or the cost of goods sold using FIFO, LIFO, and simple average.
• Calculate the closing stock of materials or finished goods using FIFO, LIFO, and simple average.
• Compare the advantages and disadvantages of each method of stock valuation.
• Specify the effects of stock valuation on trading, profits, and cost of goods sold.

Control Accounts and Self-balancing Ledgers

• Importance of control accounts
• Purchases ledger control account
• Sales ledger control account

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Determine the importance of control accounts in a business enterprise.
• Distinguish between the sales ledger control account and the purchases ledger control account.
• Identify the individual elements of control accounts.
• Prepare the control accounts

Incomplete Records and Single Entry

• Conversion of single entry to double entry
• Determination of missing figures
• Preparation of final accounts from incomplete records

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Determine the proprietor’s capital using the statement of affairs.
• Determine the number of cash balances, debtors, sales, purchases, creditors, and expenses by converting single entry to double entry.
• Use accounting equations and gross profit percentages to determine gross profit or cost of sales.

Manufacturing Accounts

• Cost classification
• Cost apportionment
• Preparation of manufacturing account

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Calculate prime cost, production overhead, production cost, and total cost
• Determine the basis of apportionment into production, administration, selling, and distribution.

Accounts of Not-For-Profit-Making Organizations

• Objectives of Not-For-Profit-Making organizations
• Receipts and payments account
• Income and expenditure account
• Statement of financial position (Balance sheet)

Objectives:

• Candidates should be able to:
• Distinguish between the features of Not-for-profit-making organizations
• Identify the subscription income, subscription in arrears and in advance
• Compute the cash balances and accumulated funds, surplus, and deficit for the period from all sources.
• Prepare: Receipts and payments account, income and expenditure account, and statement of financial position

Departmental Accounts

• Objectives
• Apportionment of expenses
• Departmental trading and profit and loss account

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Identify the reasons for departmental accounts
• Determine the expenses associated with individual departments
• Compute departmental profits or losses.

Branch Accounts

• Objectives
• Branch accounts in the head office books
• Head office account
• Reconciliation of branch and head office books

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Determine the reasons for branch accounts
• Calculate profits and losses from branches
• Identify the sources of differences and reconcile them.

Joint Venture Accounts

• Objectives
• Personal accounts of venturers
• Memorandum Joint venture accounts

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Identify the objectives of the Joint Venture
• Specify the profit or loss of the Joint Venture
• Specify the profit or loss of each venture.

Partnership Accounts

• Formation of partnership
• Profit and loss account
• Appropriation account
• Partners’ current and capital accounts
• Treatment of goodwill
• Admission/retirement of a partner
• Dissolution of partnership
• Conversion of a partnership to a company

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Determine the instruments of partnership formation;
• Categorize all accounts necessary for partnership;
• Specify the effects of admission and retirement of a partner
• Prepare revaluation account
• Determine the accounts required for dissolution and conversion to a company
• Determine the partner’s share of profits or losses.

Introduction to Company Accounts

• Formation and classification of companies
• Issue of shares and debentures
• Final accounts of companies
• Interpretation of accounts using ratios.
• The distinction between capital and revenue reserves

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Differentiate between types of companies;
• Specify the processes and procedures for recording the issue of shares and debentures;
• Compute elements of final accounts of companies;
• Interpret the accounts for decision-making using ratios such as current, acid test, and stock turnover.

Public Sector Accounting

• Similarities of cash and accrual basis of accounting
• Sources of government revenue
• Capital and recurrent expenditure
• Consolidated revenue fund
  • Statement of assets and liabilities Responsibilities and powers of the accountant general
  • The Auditor General
  • The Minister of Finance
  • The Treasurer of the local government
  • Instruments of financial regulation

Objectives: 

Candidates should be able to:

• Distinguish between public-sector accounting and private-sector accounting;
• Identify the sources of government revenue
• Differentiate between capital and recurrent expenditure
• Calculate consolidated revenue fund and determine the values of assets and liabilities
• Analyze the duties of the Accountant General, the Auditor General, the Minister of Finance, and the Treasurer of local government
• Difference between the elements of control in government accounting procedures, e.g., virement, warrant, votes, authority to incur expenditure, budget, and due process certificate.

Information Technology in Accounting

• The manual and computerized accounting processing system
• Processes involved in data processing
• Computer hardware and software
• Merits and demerits of manual and computerized accounting processing system

Objectives:

Candidates should be able to:

• Relate and differentiate between manual and computerized accounting processing systems;
• Identify the processes involved in data processing.
• Relate the different components of the computer.
• Identify the advantages and disadvantages of manual and computerized accounting processing systems.

PDF Download of JAMB Syllabus for Principle of Accounts 2024/2025

You can now download the JAMB Principle of accounts syllabus as you prepare for your exams.

Conclusion

The significance of the JAMB syllabus for Principles of Accounts lies in its ability to guide candidates in focusing on specific topics while preparing for the upcoming JAMB exams.

Notably, a substantial 99% of the questions featured in the examinations are guaranteed to be derived from the syllabus, making it an invaluable resource for candidates.

We recommend downloading the syllabus PDF file available in this post to enhance your preparation. Additionally, kindly share this post with your friends to support them in achieving exceptional exam success.