In your humble opinions which firm (in UK) is better? EY (FSO, IT Advisory (Risk)) or KPMG (Management Consulting (FS) or Risk Consulting (FRM))?I would just like to get a feel for what people on this forum think and how these 2 firms are rated in terms of reuptation, work life balance, how they treat their staff and in general, who wins the better projects in FS.Long story short, I am at KPMG outside of the UK and not sure whether I should transfer to UK with them or accept an offer from EY.Thanks,Big Mac

There are rumours that KPMG UK rules of conduct explicitly forbid staff from using eau de Cologne perfume.Dunno much more...

EY has the stronger rep in FS, at least in risk, but IT Risk Advisory is too assurance driven (see other threads on this). If you would be working on infosec it would be worthwhile - its a booming area, but otherwise I would opt for FRM then MC FS at KPMG in that order. As to which wins better projects in this area it's not an overwhelming factor anyway - pace and complexity of regulation etc means FS clients are drowing not waving. All other factors being equal go with whichever pays best cause there really isnt much between them.

The options you mentioned are quite different so it really depends what you want. Having had a briefd stint in IT risk/assurance, all I can say is that [i]I'd rather roll on broken glass with my fly open™[/i] than do that type of work again.

I currently work at KPMG in FRM and I find it to be extremelty assurance focussed. In fact every single piece of work since starting here has been an assurance or complaince piece, and to your point Diamond, I would rather poke needles in my eye than do anymore of that type of work!EY IT Risk Advisory - when asking probing questions about the type of projects they win, it seems as though it more on the implementation side i.e. working in a finance change function delivering on projects (which is what I am after) but I have seen a lot of other threads mentioning that this area is more assurance focussed which has raised some concerns.Thanks for the feedback guys!

I am also interested as I have to make the choice between Deloitte Tech and EY FSO ITA.. which out of these two should I be inclined to go with?

Big Mac... Might be some confusion stemming from EY's similiarly named IT practices...."it seems as though it more on the implementation side i.e. working in a finance change function delivering on projects (which is what I am after) but I have seen a lot of other threads mentioning that this area is more assurance focussed which has raised some concerns."The implementation side you are after is IT Advisory, commonly known as ITA (part of the Performance Improvement practice). The Assurance side of things is ITRA which stands for IT Risk and Assurance (and is part of the Risk practice), and they do focus on a lot of assurance work. There's no capability in EY, that I'm aware (unless it has sprung up over the past few weeks) called IT Risk Advisory

I've got an offer for FS ITA, but first placement will be within ITRA. So I think there is a lot of cross-over.Does anyone have any thoughts on Deloitte Tech Consulting?

Thanks for this, apologies I was talking about ITA. That's a relief as I do not want to be doing any assurance work!Within ITA I believe they have specialist risk teams in Liquidity, Market and Credit which is the area I would potentially be working in.Thanks all.