Program Overview

---

BSc International Business, Finance and Economics

Overview

Course description

This interdisciplinary course offers you the opportunity to study a wide range of course units across finance, accounting, economics, business analysis, innovation, strategy and political economy.

You will study the technical tools and techniques required to measure and assess business performance, while also emphasising the importance of changing economic contexts. You will also have the opportunity to learn a foreign language as part of your degree.

Entry requirements

A-level

• AAA
• We will consider the subjects you have taken in addition to your individual grades. Due to the popularity of our courses we may prioritise applicants based on the number of preferred subjects that they are studying. We may also take into consideration the combination of subjects taken.
• Please use the list below to check our preferred subjects for BSc (Hons) International Business, Finance and Economics.
  • Accounting, Business Studies, Economics, English Language/Literature, Geography, Government and Politics, Law, Mathematics/Further Mathematics, Politics, Psychology, Quantitative Methods, Sociology and Statistics.

A-level contextual offer

• AAB-BBB
• Applicants taking A Levels are normally expected to offer three full A Levels. If you’re taking more than three A Levels, these won’t be included in your offer. We will only make offers consisting of three A Levels.

UK refugee/care-experienced offer

• AAB-BBB
• Applicants taking A Levels are normally expected to offer three full A Levels. If you’re taking more than three A Levels, these won’t be included in your offer. We will only make offers consisting of three A Levels.

International Baccalaureate

• 36 points overall. 6,6,6 in Higher Level subjects
• Applicants studying the International Baccalaureate Career Related Programme (IBCP) should contact the admissions team prior to applying so that their academic profile can be considered.

GCSE/IGCSE

• Applicants must demonstrate a broad general education including acceptable levels of Literacy and Numeracy, equivalent to at least Grade 6 or B in GCSE/IGCSE English Language and Mathematics. GCSE/IGCSE English Literature will not be accepted in lieu of GCSE/IGCSE English Language.

Other entry requirements

• Other entry requirements exist for this course. You may view these by selecting from the list below.
  • Scottish requirements
  • Welsh Baccalaureate
  • Foundation year
  • Pearson BTEC qualifications
  • OCR Cambridge Technical qualifications
  • Access to HE Diploma
  • T Level
  • Extended Project Qualification (EPQ)

Fees and funding

Fees

• Fees for entry in 2026 have not yet been set. For entry in 2025 the tuition fees were £9,535 per annum for home students, and are expected to increase slightly for 2026 entry.

Policy on additional costs

• All students should normally be able to complete their programme of study without incurring additional study costs over and above the tuition fee for that programme. Any unavoidable additional compulsory costs totalling more than 1% of the annual home undergraduate fee per annum, regardless of whether the programme in question is undergraduate or postgraduate taught, will be made clear to you at the point of application.

Scholarships/sponsorships

• The Manchester Bursary is available to UK students registered on an undergraduate degree course at Alliance MBS who have had a full financial assessment carried out by Student Finance England.
• In addition, Alliance MBS will award a range of Social Responsibility Scholarships to UK and international/EU students. These awards are worth £2,000 per year across three years of study. You must achieve AAA at A-level (or equivalent qualification) and be able to demonstrate a significant contribution and commitment to social responsibility.

Application and selection

How to apply

• Apply through UCAS.

Advice to applicants

• Mitigating circumstances may be personal or family illness, other family circumstances, change of teachers during a course, problems with school facilities or an unusual curriculum followed by your school or college. We recommend that information on mitigating circumstances that have affected or are likely to affect your academic performance will be included in the referee's report.

Interview requirements

• We do not as a rule interview applicants. However, we reserve the right to interview candidates with non-standard backgrounds, eg. Mature students and students aged under 17.

Returning to education

• The University encourages applications from applicants returning to education after employment or other experience. Your application will be considered against the standard entry criteria of the course to which you applied.

Overseas (non-UK) applicants

• International applicants will be assessed against the standard entry criteria of the course to which they are applying.

Deferrals

• Applications for deferred entry are considered equally to other applications up to the point of confirmation. Deferred entry is granted on the discretion of admissions staff, and is normally granted for one year only and 2 years at the maximum.

Course details

Course description

• This interdisciplinary course offers you the opportunity to study a wide range of course units across finance, accounting, economics, business analysis, innovation, strategy and political economy.

Aims

• This course aims to offer you an inter-disciplinary social science perspective on business that is strongly informed by leading contemporary research and which introduces you to competing and complementary perspectives on business issues.

Special features

• Join one of the UK's longest established centres for the study of economics.
• Optional language study in years 2 and 3.
• Selected course units grant exemptions from professional exams.

Teaching and learning

• You will normally study four or five course units per semester. Each week there are on average two hours of lectures for each course unit and one hour small group teaching in alternate weeks, although this varies slightly depending on course choices.

Coursework and assessment

• Essays, multiple choice tests, project reports and presentations, in-class tests and weekly assignments constitute the coursework component of assessment, although the nature and proportion of coursework varies across course units.

Course unit details

• You take courses totalling 360 credits over the duration of your studies to graduate with Honours (120 credits in each year of study). This includes a mixture of 10 and 20-credit units.

Careers

Career opportunities

• The University has its own dedicated Careers Service that you would have full access to as a student and for two years after you graduate. At Manchester you will have access to a number of opportunities to help boost your employability.

What jobs do our IBFE graduates go into?

• Examples of jobs recent IBFE graduates have gone onto include: assurance associate, audit trainee, commercial strategist and logistics graduate scheme.

Who employs them?

• A wide range of companies including: Grant Thornton, KPMG, PricewaterhouseCoopers (Cyprus), RBS and Zolfo Cooper.

What about further study?

• IBFE graduates have gone onto law conversion courses and further study in finance and international business at institutions across the UK and internationally, including ESADE Business School (Barcelona), Humboldt University (Berlin) and the College of Law.