#13 Acronyms, What are your favorites?
Feb 2nd, 2009 by pfi
From GAAP to GAAS, CPA to CPE, and AICPA to PCAOB, accountants feel the need to shoehorn as many acronyms as possible throughout their workpapers and professional lives. While accountants are busy trying to save the world, the fact remains that accountants are incredibly lazy people.
Acronyms, as you are well aware, are words formed from letters in each word. For example, “w/o/m/e” stands for without material error. When accountants need to state clearly on each workpaper (read: write the same thing twenty times) what has been done, they rely on tickmarks and acronyms.
Across all industries of practice, accountants have an endless alphabet soup of acronyms to pick from. Not only that, but new acronyms are created each day to ensure accounting remains undecipherable to the masses. This also helps maintain the steep learning curve for all newcomers.
Instead of StuffAccountantsLike listing acronyms specific to one office, we want to encourage you to post your favorite acronyms in the comments.
SHIT- Shareholder In Training
DFQ – Dumb F*cking Query
CF – Cluster F**k
I can explain more acronyms like NGO = non govt. organisation
and INGO = international non govt. organisation
, BONGO = business oriented non govt. organisation
CAPEX – Capital Expenditures
OCBOA- Other Comprehensive basis of Accounting
Can you have your CAKE and eat it too?
we put WGAF next to small differences. it stands for Who Gives A F**k. to which the reviewing senior would respond “I don’t.”
PIOOMA – Pulled it out of my a$$
WITTB (What it takes to Balance)
NFC (No fu**ing clue)
FINCN – F#&* it, not considered necessary.
My first year told me our senior was wearing GP….
granny panties.
CARINBIG!
My favorites from my days as a Big 4 audit intern:
WFP = waive further pursuit
w/o/e = without exception
CWPY = consistent with prior year
TGIF = thank God it foots (not in the wps. but something I’d always think to myself after adding a 50 page document)
wps. = workpapers
And finally, although not an abbreviation, I always liked the term “Appears reasonable,” which would invariably be followed by “WFP.”
FAM it – Fancy Accounting Maneuvers
DTMS – Does That Make Sense
NC – No Clue
GR’d – Got Reviewed
EBITDA – I can’t believe all you accounting-types haven’t posted this one yet. I love this one. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amoritzation. This falls under the category of ‘accountants are not boring people – they just get excited about boring things”.
The reason for making too much acronyms is to do our job faster but yeah, in short, accountants are lazy on that matter to write the exact words again and again so its shortened. But its cool right?
if there’s PAJE (Proposed Adjusting Journal Entries), what does CAJE mean?
CAJE=Client Adjusting Journal Entry.
Hello Sir.
Would you mind explaining the acronym of CAJE and PAJE in detail,
Thanks and Best Regards
Sokun
hi
when you got enough comfort, you can write:
NFI = No further investigation
Luckily I found this site~ The acronyms are very difficult for me to understand.
W T F? What’s This For?
Awsome article and right to the point. I am not sure if this is actually
the best place to ask but do you guys have any
ideea where to hire some professional writers? Thanks ๐