Tutorsfield Platform Data Overview: Accounting Search Patterns

AUSTRALIA — Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand (CA ANZ) has told Jobs and Skills Australia that internal auditors, external auditors, general accountants and taxation accountants are all in national shortage, based on a survey of 159 members who advertised vacancies across 2025. Vacancy fill rates came in at 40% for internal auditors, 49% for external auditors, 49% for general accountants and 55% for taxation accountants — all well below the 67% threshold Jobs and Skills Australia uses to define an occupational shortage. External auditor roles took the longest to fill, at an average of 113 days. CA ANZ has recommended general accountants, taxation accountants and external auditors be added to the 2026 Occupation Shortage List, due for release in October.

CA ANZ's submission points to state-level pressure as well, naming NSW and Victoria as the states most likely facing shortages across nearly every accounting role surveyed, with Queensland also flagged for general accountants, external auditors and tax accountants.

Page-view data from Tutorsfield (tutorsfield.com.au), an Australian tutoring directory, offers a possible early marker of that trend. Across accounting-related search pages on the platform over the past two years, 56% of views went to pages aimed at general and secondary-level accounting tutoring, against 44% for university-level coursework. That skew — more students seeking help before university than after starting a degree — is consistent with fewer students carrying accounting through into a university qualification, one possible contributor to the shrinking graduate numbers cited in industry reporting.

Separately, industry reporting has pointed to a steep decline in the number of students completing accounting qualifications in Australia over the past decade, with commentators citing falling enrolments in CA ANZ's Professional Year program as one contributor to the shrinking graduate pipeline feeding into the roles now flagged as short-staffed.

Tutorsfield connects primary, secondary and tertiary students across Australia with independent tutors across subjects including accounting, mathematics, science and languages.

More information: https://tutorsfield.com.au/