How the VirtualTutor practice set works

This is a manual practice set

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The VirtualTutor practice set requires you to complete a one month accounting cycle for one business from a

range of fictional retail businesses that supply various types of goods. The practice set is designed to be a

similar experience to completing paper-based practice set books except that this practice set is delivered

online using a web browser (without any software to install). In this context, the word “practice” does not

mean “a casual attempt” but rather an opportunity for you to demonstrate your accounting skills in your own

simulated “accounting practice”.

The accounting cycle implemented in your practice set is shown below. This practice set adopts a manual

approach. This means it requires you to complete the accounting cycle of your allotted company, entirely by

hand, albeit using the Perdisco website instead of paper.

During the accounting cycle, you will manually record transactions into the general journal and special

journals of your company and then manually post those transactions into its general ledger and subsidiary

ledgers. At the end of the month, you will construct a trial balance, record adjusting and closing entries, and

manually prepare the financial statements.

None of the above steps are automated. For example, journal entries are not automatically posted to

accounts, running balances in the accounts are not automatically maintained, and totals are not automatically

calculated. This is by design. Our website is not an accounting software package and is not meant to perform

any accounting software functions. Instead, our website is used as a teaching tool designed to give you direct

experience in all elements of a manual accounting cycle – it does not hide any of those elements behind

automated computing processes, no matter how mundane they may seem.

Please remember that the manual nature of this practice set is a matter of deliberate design – we did not

accidentally forget to let your computer add up totals! In fact, while doing all tasks by hand will take you

additional time, its point is to allow you to really understand what computers do in the background when the

accounting cycle is implemented in a software system. This is the activity that your instructor has chosen for

you to complete.