BSc (Hons) Accounting & Finance

BSc (Hons) Accounting & Finance

Most people believe that accounting is a boring job that has to do with laws, circulars and numbers, its permanent accessory being a calculator with which one constantly adds numbers. Obviously, anything related to the operation of businesses is based on the law and anything related to financial data includes numerical operations, but accounting is much more than this. And finance is a science that stretches far beyond accounting.

A financial expert is someone who will secure capital, evaluate investment decisions, manage the portfolio, the relationships with banks, insurance companies, as well as the stock market in case of a listed company, also dealing with risks, forecasts on the direction of the market in terms of interest rates, raising capital, as well as the country’s economic model. The financial sector is one of the three main pillars of a company’s operation (the other two being production and marketing) and the way it works can make the difference between a company’s success and failure. There are several examples of businesses that had a very good product and successful marketing, but went bankrupt due to poor financial decisions.

Particularly in a complex international environment in which funds can be transferred from one end of the world to the other just by pressing a button, the financial expert proves to be a valuable partner for every business and the person who can successfully lead it to the international markets. Indeed, if we also consider that every business has its peculiarities and moves in a different financial “ecosystem”, it is clear how important it is for a member of the industry to have been taught and to know in depth the financial “personality” of companies with a different organisation and operation: industrial, commercial, primary production, or service companies, banks, stock exchange companies, insurance companies, public organisations etc.

In the Greek as well as the foreign market, specialised financial scientists are in high demand, therefore commanding high salaries.

Graduates can work as freelancers (financial advisors or accountants) or as business executives, or continue with postgraduate degrees (Master’s, PhD), attending all their classes and preparing all their assignments in Greece (in the English language) at BCA.

Programme Characteristics

1. Students are introduced to economic thinking. The programme talks about the economic system, the scarcity of resources and the economic choices of entities that are part of the economy. It describes the main characteristics of the market mechanism (demand and supply) and focuses on price setting, the market system, production and cost. It describes various market structures (perfect competition, monopoly, monopolistic competition and oligopoly).
2. It studies both microeconomics and macroeconomics, analysing concepts such as production, unemployment, inflation, salaries, consumption, investment, taxation, government expenditure, imports, exports, interest rates and exchange rates.
3. Data on the performance of the Greek economy are also presented.
4. Teaching is conducted through a combination of methods that aim to sharpen students’ creativity and develop their critical thinking. It is complemented by lectures and seminars by market executives.
5. Great importance is attached to new digital technologies, which have facilitated the work of the accounting department and have created very efficient evaluation and auditing tools.
6. Students can learn foreign languages on top of those that they may already know, thus gaining a significant advantage in today’s globalised job market.
7.  The programme is conducted in cooperation with the leading UK-based University of West London, which is responsible for designing the programme, conducting examinations and awarding the relevant degrees.

Mr Elias Pavlou was educated both in Australia and the UK. He received his first degree in mathematics by the University of Wollongong, Australia. He continued his tertiary studies in the University of NSW, Australia where he acquired a Masters in Statistics. Later on, while working in the city of London as an analyst, he completed a Masters degree in Finance at the University of London, Birkbeck college.

Mr Pavlou has been working at the Business College of Athens since 2009 where he teaches quantitative modules and research methods both at undergraduate and