Accounting is a system of gathering, analysing, recording, reporting and interpreting financial information that will assist in making informed business decisions. The accounting discipline is constantly changing in response to the external environ-ment, and is both stimulating and far-reaching. Basic accounting for non-accountants is an introductory text that covers aspects of financial accounting, cost and management accounting and financial management.

Basic accounting for non-accountants includes comprehensive illustrative examples that are easy to understand. All chap-ters have been updated and additional tutorial questions have been provided to give students sufficient practice to rein-force their newly acquired knowledge. This third edition also covers a new topic – capital budgeting.

Contents include the following:

• Drawing up basic financial statements

• Interpreting financial statements using ratio analysis

• Calculating the cost of products

• Preparing budgets

• Short-term decision making

• Variance analysis

• Time value of money

• Capital budgeting

Basic accounting for non-accountants is aimed at students with little or no prior accounting background and can be used as a theoretical basis for the advancement of their lifelong learning.

Melanie Cloete and Ferina Marimuthu are knowledgeable in both the education and the accounting fields and have been working as academics at the Durban University of Technology (KwaZulu-Natal) for more than two decades.