Accounting interviews in Pakistan are refreshingly concrete: interviewers dictate a transaction and ask for the journal entry, probe depreciation methods, or hand you a reconciliation scenario. Whether you're interviewing at a Big Four firm or an industrial accounts department, these are the recurring questions.
For the three account types: Personal — debit the receiver, credit the giver. Real — debit what comes in, credit what goes out. Nominal — debit expenses and losses, credit incomes and gains. Modern interviews may prefer the accounting-equation framing (assets = liabilities + equity, with debit/credit effects per element), so know both vocabularies and say you can work in either.
Debit Ali (Accounts Receivable) 50,000; Credit Sales 50,000. Expect immediate follow-ups: on receipt — Debit Cash/Bank, Credit Ali; if he returns 10,000 of goods — Debit Sales Returns, Credit Ali. Dictated-entry chains like this are the core of Pakistani accounts interviews; practise until they're reflexive.
Systematic allocation of an asset's cost over its useful life. Straight-line charges an equal amount yearly ((cost − residual)/life); reducing balance applies a fixed percentage to the shrinking book value, front-loading expense. Follow-up worth knowing: depreciation is a non-cash expense — it reduces profit but not cash, which is why it's added back in cash flow statements.
Matching the cash book against the bank statement and explaining every difference: unpresented cheques, deposits in transit, bank charges and direct debits not yet recorded, and errors on either side. It's the most common practical test for accounts officer roles — interviewers may hand you a mini-reconciliation on paper, so practise the standard format.
Accrual recognises revenue when earned and expenses when incurred, regardless of cash movement — required under IFRS and the Companies Act for companies. Cash basis records only when money moves — acceptable for small setups. The bridge concepts (accrued expenses, prepayments, unearned revenue) are frequent follow-ups: know their journal entries.
Capital expenditure creates or enhances a long-term asset (machinery purchase, building extension) and is capitalised then depreciated; revenue expenditure maintains operations (repairs, salaries, rent) and hits the P&L immediately. Classic trap question: major overhaul that extends an asset's life — that's capital, and interviewers use it to check you reason rather than memorise.
Working-level answer: sales tax (standard 18%) is charged on taxable supplies, with input tax adjustable against output tax, filed monthly on FBR's IRIS portal. Withholding tax is deducted at source on payments like salaries, supplier invoices, and services at prescribed rates, deposited with FBR, and reported in withholding statements. Even basic fluency here separates candidates for industry roles, since most day-one work touches these filings.
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