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Accounting and Tally Interview Questions for Freshers (2026): B.Com and BBA Roles

Updated August 2026

An accounts executive interview is one of the most concrete fresher interviews there is. Nobody asks where you see yourself in five years for the first twenty minutes. They ask you to pass a journal entry, explain what happens when a trial balance does not tally, describe which voucher type you would use for a particular transaction, and say what you would do about an entry you posted wrongly last week. The questions have right answers, they come from your own syllabus, and a fortnight of focused revision changes your performance more than anything else available to you.

That is good news for a group that receives very little placement attention. Commerce graduates watch an IT-dominated campus season in which most of the calendar is closed to them, and the guidance that reaches them is written for engineers. Yet the roles are real and numerous — accounts executive and assistant, accounts payable and receivable, GST and taxation assistants, audit assistants in chartered accountancy firms, and the finance and accounting delivery teams of the large business process employers — across every city in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, because every business of any size needs someone who can keep its books.

This page is domain-led rather than tool-led. Tally matters and is covered properly, but a candidate who knows which button to press without understanding the entry behind it is exposed by the first follow-up question, and employers ask that follow-up. Our Excel guide covers the spreadsheet skills that sit alongside this work. One important boundary throughout: everything here explains concepts. Nothing on this page is tax advice, and no rate, threshold, due date or filing requirement is stated as current fact — those come from the official GST portal, the Income Tax Department, CBIC and a qualified professional, all of which change and must be checked at the time.

Frequently asked questions

What are the golden rules of accounting?

Under the traditional classification there are three, and each applies to a type of account. For personal accounts — those of persons, firms and institutions — debit the receiver and credit the giver. For real accounts, which are assets, debit what comes in and credit what goes out. For nominal accounts, which are expenses, losses, incomes and gains, debit all expenses and losses and credit all incomes and gains. Interviewers usually follow up by giving you a transaction and asking you to apply them, so practise stating the rule and then the entry: paid rent by cash, for instance, is rent account debited as a nominal account expense and cash account credited as a real account going out. It is also worth knowing the modern approach, where accounts are classified as assets, liabilities, capital, income and expenses with rules framed around increases and decreases, since some interviewers use that vocabulary instead.

Walk me through the accounting cycle.

A transaction occurs and is evidenced by a source document — an invoice, a receipt, a bank statement. It is recorded as a journal entry, with at least one debit and one credit of equal value. The entries are posted to the relevant ledger accounts, where each account accumulates its own transactions and produces a balance. Those balances are collected into a trial balance, which checks that total debits equal total credits. Adjusting entries are then passed for items such as outstanding expenses, prepaid expenses, depreciation, closing stock and provisions. From the adjusted figures the final accounts are prepared — the trading and profit and loss account, and the balance sheet. The books are then closed for the period. Being able to narrate this cleanly matters because it shows you understand where any single entry sits in the whole, which is precisely what someone doing the work needs to know.

What is the difference between capital and revenue expenditure?

Capital expenditure is spending that creates or improves a long-term asset, or extends its useful life or capacity — buying a machine, purchasing a building, a major overhaul that increases output. It is capitalised on the balance sheet and charged against profit gradually through depreciation. Revenue expenditure is spending on the day-to-day running of the business whose benefit is consumed within the period — rent, salaries, repairs that merely maintain an asset, consumables — and it is charged in full to the profit and loss account. The distinction matters because misclassifying one as the other misstates both profit and the balance sheet: treating a capital item as revenue understates profit and assets, and the reverse overstates them. Interviewers often test it with a borderline example such as repairs to a newly bought second-hand machine to make it usable, which is generally capitalised because it brings the asset to working condition.

Explain depreciation and the common methods.

Depreciation is the systematic allocation of the cost of a fixed asset over its useful life, matching the cost against the periods that benefit from it. It is not a valuation exercise and it is not a cash outflow — the cash left when the asset was bought. The straight line method charges an equal amount each year, computed from cost less residual value divided by useful life, which suits assets that give even service. The written down value or reducing balance method applies a fixed percentage to the falling book value, so the charge is heavier in early years, which suits assets that lose value or need more maintenance as they age. Other methods such as units of production exist for specific cases. A common follow-up is why a company might use different methods for different assets, and the answer is that the method should reflect the pattern in which the asset's economic benefits are consumed. Rates and any statutory requirements are set by the applicable law and standards, so cite those rather than a remembered percentage.

What is a bank reconciliation statement and why is it prepared?

It is a statement reconciling the balance shown by the bank column of your cash book with the balance on the bank statement at the same date, explaining every difference between them. Differences arise because the two records are updated at different moments: cheques you issued and recorded that have not yet been presented, cheques you deposited and recorded that have not yet cleared, bank charges and interest the bank has applied that you have not yet entered, direct debits and credits made by the bank, and errors on either side. Preparing it matters for two reasons — it catches your own recording errors and omissions, and it is a basic fraud and control check, since an unexplained difference is exactly where a problem surfaces. In practice it is done monthly, and in Tally it is performed within the bank ledger by marking the clearing dates against each entry.

My trial balance does not tally. How do you find the error?

Work systematically rather than hunting. First find the difference and look for it directly — check whether an amount equal to the difference has been omitted, and whether half the difference corresponds to an amount posted on the wrong side, which is a very common cause. If the difference is divisible by nine, suspect a transposition such as 540 entered as 450. Then recheck the additions of the trial balance itself and of the ledger accounts, verify that every ledger balance has been carried to the correct column, and confirm the totals of subsidiary books have been posted. Check that both halves of each journal entry reached the ledger. Where the books must be closed before the error is found, the difference is placed in a suspense account and cleared once located. It is also worth saying what a tallied trial balance does not prove: errors of omission, of principle, compensating errors and wrong-account errors all leave it in balance, which is why reconciliation and review still matter.

What is the difference between a provision and a reserve?

A provision is a charge against profit made for a known liability or an expected loss whose amount cannot be determined precisely — provision for doubtful debts, provision for taxation, provision for depreciation. It must be created whether or not the business is profitable, because it reflects an obligation or an impairment that already exists. A reserve is an appropriation of profit, set aside out of profits that have already been earned, to strengthen the business or for a specific future purpose — general reserve, dividend equalisation reserve. It can only be created when there are profits. The practical distinction interviewers want: a provision reduces profit, whereas a reserve is a distribution of profit that has already been calculated. Being able to name where each appears in the accounts is a useful addition to the answer.

What are outstanding and prepaid expenses, and how are they treated?

An outstanding expense is one that has been incurred in the period but not yet paid — salaries for the last month of the year paid in the following month. It is added to the relevant expense in the profit and loss account and shown as a current liability in the balance sheet, because the business owes it. A prepaid expense is one paid in this period whose benefit belongs to the next — insurance paid annually in advance. It is deducted from the expense in the profit and loss account and shown as a current asset, because the business is owed the service. Both exist because of the accrual principle, which says income and expenses are recognised when they are earned or incurred rather than when cash moves. The corresponding items on the income side are accrued income and income received in advance, and being able to name all four shows you understand the principle rather than the pair.

What is accrual basis versus cash basis accounting?

Under the cash basis, income is recorded when cash is received and expenses when cash is paid, so the accounts follow the bank. Under the accrual basis, income is recognised when it is earned and expenses when they are incurred, regardless of when cash moves — which is why outstanding expenses, prepaid expenses, accrued income and depreciation exist at all. The accrual basis gives a truer picture of performance for a period because it matches revenues with the costs incurred to earn them, which is why it is the basis used for the financial statements of businesses of any size. The cash basis is simpler and is sometimes used by very small operations or for specific statutory purposes. Where a particular basis is required by law for a particular purpose, that requirement comes from the applicable statute rather than from preference, so name the principle and leave the requirement to the law.

What is GST, and what do CGST, SGST and IGST mean?

Goods and Services Tax is an indirect tax on the supply of goods and services in India, designed as a destination-based tax that replaced a number of earlier central and state levies. Its structure is dual: for a supply within a state, central GST and state GST are levied together, with the two components going to the central and state governments respectively. For a supply between states, integrated GST is levied instead and is subsequently apportioned. A union territory variant applies in the relevant territories. The mechanism that makes it a value-added tax is input tax credit, described in the next answer. Everything about rates, thresholds, exemptions, classifications and procedures is set by law and changes — so explain the structure in an interview, and take any specific rate, limit or due date from the official GST portal, CBIC or a qualified professional rather than from memory or from this page.

Explain input tax credit as a concept.

Input tax credit is the mechanism by which a registered business offsets the GST it has paid on its purchases and expenses against the GST it collects on its sales, so that tax is effectively borne on the value the business adds rather than on the full sale value at every stage. Without it, tax would cascade — tax charged on a price that already includes tax — which is the problem the design is intended to solve. Conceptually the credit depends on the purchase being for business use, on holding a valid tax invoice, on the supplier having actually reported and paid, and on the recipient meeting the conditions the law lays down; there are also categories on which credit is blocked. All of those conditions, and the reconciliation processes around them, are governed by the law and its rules and have been amended repeatedly. So describe the concept and the reason it exists in an interview, and treat the conditions in any real case as something to verify against the current law rather than assert.

What is TDS, and what does an accounts executive do about it?

Tax Deducted at Source is a mechanism by which the person making certain specified payments deducts tax at the point of payment and remits it to the government on the recipient's behalf, so that tax is collected as income arises rather than only at the end of the year. The recipient gets credit for the amount deducted against their own liability. For an accounts executive the practical involvement is recognising that a payment falls within a category where deduction applies, deducting at the applicable rate, depositing within the prescribed timeline, filing the periodic returns, and issuing the certificates that let the recipient claim credit. A deductor needs its own tax deduction account number. Which payments attract deduction, at what rates, with what thresholds and by when — all of that is statutory, is amended regularly, and is exactly what you should never quote from memory. Say what the mechanism is, say that the specifics come from the Income Tax Act and the department's current guidance, and you will sound more professional rather than less.

Which voucher types does Tally use, and when would you use each?

The main ones and their uses: Payment for money going out, Receipt for money coming in, Contra for movements between cash and bank or between bank accounts, Journal for adjusting and non-cash entries such as depreciation or provisions, Sales for sales invoices, Purchase for purchase invoices, Credit Note for sales returns or reductions, and Debit Note for purchase returns. Inventory-related vouchers such as delivery note, receipt note and stock journal handle goods movement where inventory features are in use. The question behind the question is usually whether you understand the entry rather than the menu — for example that a contra never touches a profit and loss account because it is a transfer between your own cash and bank, or that depreciation goes through a journal because no money moves. Knowing the function keys is a small bonus rather than the point.

What is the difference between a ledger and a group in Tally?

A ledger is an individual account you post to — a specific customer, a specific supplier, a bank account, a rent account. A group is the classification that ledger belongs to, such as sundry debtors, sundry creditors, indirect expenses, current assets or fixed assets, and groups themselves sit under primary groups. The grouping is what determines where a balance appears in the financial statements, so the choice is not cosmetic: putting a rent ledger under direct expenses instead of indirect expenses changes the gross profit that the accounts report. In practice this is one of the most common places a fresher does damage, because a wrongly grouped ledger produces statements that look plausible and are wrong. If you are asked how you would set up a new expense head, mention checking the group as part of the answer.

How would you record a purchase with GST in Tally?

At concept level: create or verify the supplier ledger under sundry creditors with their registration details, ensure the purchase ledger and the stock items or service ledgers are configured with the correct tax details, and set up the tax ledgers for the relevant components. Then pass a purchase voucher selecting the supplier, entering the items or services with quantities and rates, letting the tax components compute, and matching the total to the supplier invoice. The invoice number and date matter because the reconciliation between what you have recorded and what the supplier has reported depends on them. The judgement part, which is what an interviewer is actually probing, is knowing that whether a transaction attracts central and state components or the integrated component depends on the place of supply rather than on where the supplier is registered alone, and knowing that if the tax total does not match the supplier invoice you stop and investigate rather than adjusting a figure to make it agree.

You posted an entry to the wrong ledger last week. What do you do?

Say clearly that you would tell your senior and correct it properly rather than quietly, because this question is testing integrity as much as technique. The correct treatment is a rectification entry that moves the amount from the wrong account to the right one, dated and narrated so that anyone reviewing the books later can see what happened and why. Where the period is still open and the organisation's procedure permits it, correcting the original entry may be acceptable — but that is a matter for the organisation's policy and its controls, not for your discretion, and modern accounting software retains an edit log for exactly this reason, with audit-trail requirements applying to certain classes of company under the applicable rules. What is never acceptable is deleting an entry to hide it or altering a record so the mistake disappears. Everyone posts a wrong entry at some point; how you handle it is what an employer is hiring on.

What is the difference between a debit note and a credit note?

They record adjustments after an invoice has been issued, and which one you use depends on which side of the transaction you are and what is being adjusted. A debit note is typically issued by a buyer to a supplier when returning goods or claiming a reduction, recording that the supplier now owes the buyer — from the buyer's books, the supplier account is debited. A credit note is typically issued by a seller to a customer for a sales return, an allowance or an overcharge, recording that the customer owes less — from the seller's books, the customer account is credited. In a GST context the documents also carry tax implications, since an adjustment to the taxable value changes the tax charged, and the law prescribes how and by when such documents are to be reported. The interview point is that you know who issues which, in what circumstances, and that the entry follows the document rather than the other way round.

What roles are actually open to a B.Com or BBA fresher, and what do they pay?

Several, and they differ more than students assume. Accounts executive or assistant at a business of any size — bookkeeping, vouchers, reconciliations, statutory support — is the largest volume route, indicatively ₹1.5–3 LPA at entry depending on the employer and city. Accounts payable or receivable roles in larger organisations are more specialised versions of the same. Audit assistant positions in chartered accountancy firms pay modestly at entry but teach a great deal quickly and are respected afterwards. GST and taxation assistant roles sit with practices and consultancies. And the finance and accounting delivery teams of large business process employers are a genuinely different proposition — more structured, better paid at entry, indicatively ₹2.2–4 LPA, with defined progression and a route into analytics; our WNS guide sets out how that career actually works, including the process-tower question that shapes it. Figures are indicative and vary widely.

How much does knowing Tally actually matter, and what else should I learn?

It matters as a hiring filter and it does not carry an interview on its own. A great many small and medium businesses in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana run their books on it, so being genuinely comfortable — masters, vouchers, groups, GST configuration, bank reconciliation, reports — is what gets you shortlisted for a large number of local roles. What it will not do is compensate for weak accounting: a candidate who can navigate the software but cannot explain the entry behind what they are recording is exposed by the first follow-up question, and employers ask it deliberately. So learn the domain first and the tool alongside. Beyond Tally, two additions repay the effort more than any further software: Excel to a real level, since reconciliations, analysis and reporting all live there, and a professional qualification such as CMA or ACCA if you want to move beyond bookkeeping. Familiarity with a larger ERP is useful if you are aiming at bigger organisations.

I am in the 2027 batch. How should I prepare, and when?

Start with the fundamentals rather than the software, because they are what the interview turns on and they take longer to build. Get the golden rules and journal entries to the point where you can pass an entry for an unfamiliar transaction without hesitating, then the accounting cycle end to end, then the adjustment items — outstanding, prepaid, depreciation, provisions — and the ability to explain a bank reconciliation and a trial balance mismatch. Learn Tally properly alongside, ideally on real or realistic data rather than only in a classroom, and understand GST and TDS at concept level while being scrupulous about not quoting rates or deadlines. Add Excel deliberately, since it is the single highest-return additional skill in this field. Look for an internship at a chartered accountancy firm or a small business during a vacation, because a few weeks of real books teaches things no syllabus does. And if a larger, more structured career is what you want, look at the business process employers as well as the local market — most commerce students never apply to them at all.

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