BPP: Dec 2007 Exam Tips (P1)
November 6th, 2007 - Admin

ACCA Paper P1
Professional Accountant
December 2007 Exam Tips and Useful Articles

Tipping is not a precise science at the best of time, and for the first sitting of a brand new paper it is little more than a 'shot in the dark'. It would be inappropriate to guess what is likely to appear in the first exam, so the following tips suggest important areas to cover. However please remember that no one knows what is in the exam, apart from the examiner. Your safest bet is to achieve good syllabus coverage in your revision, as the examiner aims to do in the exam.

The following is a guide to areas that you should include as part of your revision:

Section A:

Application of corporate governance principles:
A deep understanding of the purpose and aims of good corporate governance, together with an appreciation of the relevance of different approaches (rules or principles) that could be utilised is key. Questions are likely to require the application of corporate governance to address organisational control deficiencies described in the scenario is quite likely.

Identification and assessment of all aspects of business risk:
The use of a methodical approach to identify, categorise and assess the array of risks facing an organisation will be a common feature of scenario questions. From this position the examiner can than then ask candidates to propose and recommend remedies.

Internal control mechanisms and their review:
Internal management control systems are a key feature of any successful organisation. Indeed corporate governance mechanism could in themselves be viewed as of the internal control framework. The questions are likely to either identify deficiencies in internal controls or ask students to suggest enhanced controls to manage risks identified.

Corporate social responsibility and environmental management:
The need to act appropriately in terms of social and environmental responsibilities is key feature of the modern business world, and could be an element of a scenario question. This being the ethical stance that an organisation takes allows for many theories and frameworks to be incorporated into answers.

Section B:

Although likely to be based on small scenarios, Section B questions are likely to test specific areas of the syllabus in more detail.

Corporate Governance:
This could require detailed discussion of aspects of the Combined Code or Sarbanes Oxley, or even a comparison between the two. Specific areas relating to the role of non-executive directors, remuneration and disclosure requirements could also be tested, which requires the recollection of detailed syllabus knowledge to secure a good mark.

Risk assessment and management:
Describing the frameworks used in assessing and controlling risk any organisation either in a holistic view in specific detail (e.g. risk profiling) could be on the paper. However there will be no computation of the value of risk required.

Internal control (inc. internal audit):
Approaches to enterprise risk management together with embedded /cultural risk awareness would appear to be prime topic worthy of revision.

Professional values and ethics:
An array ethical theories and frameworks could be specified and tested in detail. Emphasis is likely to be on the role of the professional accountant and the possible conflicts and threats to independence that can arise and need to be resolved.

Useful Articles:

If you want to read around the subject or improve your understanding there are a number of articles on the ACCA website.

'Big Brother' by George Bakehouse studies ethics and how advances in information technology have changed the way businesses work

Effective report writing by Mustafa Muchhala explains the key points of effective report writing

'Examiner's approach to Paper P1, Professional Accountant' by David Campbell, examiner for Paper P1offers his approach to the Professional Accountant paper

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Added on November 6, 2007, 11:05 pmBPP: DEC'07 EXAM TIPS (F6, F7, F8, F9)
November 6th, 2007 - Admin

ACCA Paper F6
Taxation (FA 2006)
December 2007 Exam Tips and Useful Articles
This exam consists entirely of compulsory questions; this makes question spotting very dangerous. The purpose of this analysis is to highlight areas of the syllabus that we would expect to be regularly tested based on the pilot paper and the sittings of the old 2.3 papers which was also examined by your examiner David Harrowven. We can also predict some of the areas that questions will cover from the guidance already given by this examiner.
Use the following tips as important areas to cover but remember that no one knows what is in the exam, apart obviously from the examiner. Your safest best is to achieve good syllabus coverage in your revision, as the examiner aims to do in the exam.

Question one

This question will cover income tax. Key areas expected to be tested are profit adjustment and capital allowances for a sole trader and the benefit rules for an employee. Smaller areas like property income and investment income could be bought into the computation with a number of marks being allocated for return submission and payment of tax dates.

Question two

Question two will cover corporation tax. Profit adjustment and capital allowances for both plant and machinery and industrial buildings allowances are regularly incorporated into this question. Smaller areas like property income and capital gains involving rollover relief are also likely.
Groups or overseas aspects could appear in part b).

Question three

This question will cover capital gains tax. The question will be split into a number of different disposals, covering part disposals, shares and securities, chattels and gift relief.

Question four

Income tax losses or partnerships are likely candidates for this question

Question five

VAT focusing on registration rules, calculation of VAT liability, special schemes like cash accounting and annual accounting.

Useful Articles

Examiner's approach to Paper F6 (UK) by David Harrowven; December 2006
Finance Act 2006 by David Harrowven and Rory Fish; December 2006

ACCA PAPER F7 (GLOBAL)

DECEMBER 2007 EXAM TIPS

The whole exam is compulsory
. Q1 (25 marks): Consolidated income statement (P&L) and/or balance sheet with one subsidiary plus associate (including adjustments for fair values, unrealised profit, intragroup trading, goods/cash in transit. Discursive part (b) on fair values or other group topic.
. Q2 (25 marks): Accounts preparation/restatement with adjustments e.g. current/deferred tax, depreciation, inventory (stock) valuation, leases, construction contracts, substance over form issues, financial instruments (amortised cost), revaluations, share issues or government grants. May include disclosure of discontinued operations, movement in reserves/ statement of recognised income & expense (gains & losses) or EPS calculation.
. Q3 (25 marks): Interpretation and/or cash flow statement
. Q4 (15 marks): Theoretical/Conceptual question - possibly on provisions, inflation, accounting policies, leases or substance over form issues with reference to the conceptual framework
. Q5 (10 marks): Mixed bag question (e.g. tangible/intangible assets, impairment, deferred tax, governments grants, financial instruments, substance over form issues or EPS)



ACCA Paper F8
Audit & Assurance
December 2007 Exam Tips

All of the questions in this exam are compulsory and the examiner aims to test the syllabus widely at each sitting so it is very dangerous to rely on question spotting as you revise for this paper. The following outline aims to indicate the type of questions that may come up in the exam. Only the examiner knows what has been put into the paper, so these suggestions have been based on the content of the pilot paper, comments made and articles written by the examiner and the content of the old syllabus paper 2.6. The paper F8 examiner, Alan Lewin, set the old syllabus paper 2.6 from June 2005 to June 2007.

Suggested practice questions from the BPP Practice and Revision Kit (2007 edition) for the International stream or the UK stream are shown after the relevant area. It is also worth reviewing the past exam questions mentioned to give you an idea of how a topic has been examined recently. These are easily available on the ACCA website (www.accaglobal.com/students).

Question 1 (30 marks)
This will take the form of a case study with four or five separate requirements. The main requirements are likely to focus on audit procedures on a core area of the financial statements, such as revenue and receivables, purchases and payables or inventory.

Other parts of the question may look at internal controls in the same areas of the accounting system, or the auditor's use of computer-assisted techniques.

2007 P&R Kit Questions: Q39 Tracey Transporters (non-current assets), Q43 Rocks Forever (inventory), Q45 Coogee (receivables) Q46 Duckworth (bank) Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q1 Westra (purchases and payables)

Question 2 (10 marks)

This will be a 10 mark factual question and likely to cover at least three separate topic areas. The requirements are likely to test basic knowledge of ISAs. The examiner's aim in this question is to broaden his coverage of the syllabus, so these could be drawn from any area.

2007 P&R Kit Questions: Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q2, Q44 Receivables circularisations Q55 audit confirmations, Q59 Sheraton

Questions 3, 4 and 5 (20 marks each)
The examiner has said that these will be very similar in style to the questions he used to set in the old syllabus paper 2.6. This means that they will tend to have three or four separate requirements, and be based on short scenarios and syllabus areas as listed below. (Relevant questions from the 2007 P & R kit are listed separately after each topic.)
. Audit ethics Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q3 (a),Q11 Confidentiality and independence
. Audit risk Q20 Parker, Q18 Tempest
. Corporate governance and its links with either internal or external audit Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q3 (b) and (C)
. Internal controls, possibly with requirements in the style of a "report to management" Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q4 (a),Q33 Cosmo
. Audit completion and areas such as going concern, management representations, events after the balance sheet date and audit reporting
Mock exam 3 (pilot paper) Q5 Q61 Mowbray Computers

Relevant Articles
The following articles can be found in the Student Accountant magazine (or ACCA website)
. Audit working papers, Namasiku Liandu, February 2007
. Examiner's approach to paper F8, Alan Lewin, February 2007
. Audit risk in a brave new world, Namasiku Liandu, 30 September 2004
. Internal audit and review reports, Katherine Bagshaw, January 2003
. The role of internal audit in risk management, Katherine Bagshaw, April 2002
. Directional testing - a methodology, Kim Smith, May 2001

ACCA Paper F9
Financial Management
December 2007 Exam Tips and Useful Articles

This exam consists entirely of compulsory questions; this makes question spotting particularly dangerous. The purpose of this analysis is to highlight areas the major syllabus areas that we would expect to be regularly tested based on the pilot paper and the sittings of the old syllabus 2.4 paper which was also examined by your examiner Anthony Head (since 2003).

Use the following tips as important areas to cover but remember that no one knows what is in the exam, apart from the examiner. Your safest bet is to achieve good syllabus coverage in your revision, as the examiner aims to do in the exam.

Financial management function:

Key ratios such as return on capital employed, return on equity, earnings per share and dividend per share and total shareholder return can be used to evaluate an organisation's performance from the point of view of its shareholders. Don't forget value for money as a useful framework for assessing the performance of not for profit organisations.

Working capital management:

Ratios, including inventory days, average collection period and average payment period & average payable period can be used to calculate the operating ratio. This is often tested with numbers and a discussion of how to improve working capital management. This discussion could include debt factors and invoice discounting.

The sales revenue/ net working capital ratio has been specifically mentioned and can be used to forecast finance needs.

Investment appraisal:

NPV with tax is commonly tested with a discussion either of alternative methods of appraisal (e.g. ROCE, IRR or payback) or an analysis of risk or uncertainty.

Business finance:

You may be asked to assess the impact of sources of finance using ratios such as operational and financial gearing and interest coverage.

Cost of capital:

Questions are likely to focus on the calculation of the weighted average cost of capital and a discussion of strategies to reduce the weighted average cost of capital in the style of the pilot paper question on this area.

Business valuations:

This was not tested in the pilot paper but is a major syllabus area. Questions are likely to focus on the use of the share valuation models (asset, dividend, earnings) and a discussion of their limitations.

Risk management:

A risk management question is likely to focus on currency hedging using forwards and money market hedging. Other topics that are likely to be tested here include interest rate parity theory and the purpose of currency futures and options (without numbers).

Useful Articles:

If you want to read around the subject or improve your understanding there are a number of articles on the ACCA website. Scott Goddard (the examiner) has not written anything recently although the following articles are still relevant to the syllabus.