Just some general tips for you :
1) Never take any advance professional qualification in established univerisities like monash, taylor, sunway (exception in lower level) or segi.....
Therefore taking acca in place like MARA or any govt linked tuition provider is NOT RECOMMENDED.
The reason bcos no single centre can accumulate all lecturers for each paper. That situation can never happen like Man utd can never have
11 C. Ronaldo on the field.

2) Professional qulaification IS NOT a degree programme.
Everyone will take a similar exam paper so whenever you go you are recognised even place as remote as siberia or powerhouse like manhattan.
Diploma / degree / master / Phd depends on WHERE you take, do you think a US company will accept a degree student from a college in malaysia compared to its ivy league graduates, 99.99% they will not.

For the part of whether accounting is better i cannot really say since many profession can generate the same reply :
- Without engineer there is no future
- Without doctor you will die quicker
- Without architect building will collapse
- Without lawyer there will be a lot of criminals
- Without accountant there is no above (something i read in acca poster about even footballers need accountants)

I cannot advise based on what is the best for "you". It depends on what you want as well : glamour, money, respect, power.....girls / guys ?

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Added on February 10, 2009, 12:07 amIt depends on what you want & planned to do in future :
1) You are leaving malaysia soon
Don't take tax : take finance + PM

2) Plan to join big 4 for long term
Take audit & tax

3) Plan to pass only
Take PM . Audit is not that difficult but need decent tuition provider

4) Plan to learn more
Take finance + tax

Linkage between precedent paper :
P4 is an expansion from F9 which you will learn a lot of new things & more difficult stuff to cope. Pretty calculational compared to theory
P5 is add-onn from F5 which is quite similar & borrow some stuff from P3. Balanced in theory & calcualtional
P6 is more speciallised than F6 which you will learn a lot of things examiner felt F6 is too deep. Need to memorise a lot.
P7 is more practical than F8 which you need to have good reporting skill to audit. Nothing much to learn since you need to undertand more. Theory.

I just simply pick option 4 because i have nothing much to do while waiting for my core paper results (which is agonizingly stressful)

This post has been edited by Topace111: Feb 10 2009, 12:07 AM

CAT take at sunway.
After completing cat take the respective advance acca paper at KL.
You should find a speciallist lecturer for each paper instead of taking it all at one centre.

I am not sure about sunway cost for CAT.
KL centres should be around 600 - 700 for fundamental papers and > 800 for professional papers for full term.
That is excluding exam fees of course.

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Added on February 10, 2009, 3:32 pmP1 : Phillip Woo (KSA) or Sheila (MCO)
P2 : Menon (Sunway) or Haneef (MCO)
P3 : Parmindar (KSA)

This post has been edited by Topace111: Feb 10 2009, 03:32 PM

To those wishing to self study / preview on core papers / suit lecturer style you may want to read on this :
P1 : Professional a/c
Major area split into Corporate governance (60%) + ethics, audit & environmental stuff (40%)
Many lecturers will say CG is very important in exam (so many will spot here) but exam trend now favours more to ethics.
I think examiner felt CG can also be tested in other papers like P2 & P3 (even P4).
The entire syllabus mostly touch on roles (Ie : directors, CEO, Chairman.......)
More memorisation compared to understanding since you need to list down the general points before going for applicational points.
If want to self study this paper is the easiest among the 3 core (but audit part needs guidance)
The examiner can really ask anything under the moon so its hard to spot.

P2 : Reporting
This is an order (not opinion) PLEASE DO NOT SELF STUDY.
The syllabus is that wide compared to P3 but you must really know everything especially on standards (many of them)
The paper is currently on a trend moving to theory based so understanding / comprehension is CRUCIAL.
P2 is the most important & most relevant of the 3 core papers so if examiner wants to filter out incompetent student they will do it here.
P2 examiner likes to test student with new stuff every seating but based on same old principle.
So even if you spot correctly it may be a very different version of the one you are comfortable with.

P3 : Biz analysis
These paper is quite related to MBA so if you want to self study its ok.
Syllabus is very very wide but even if you know half of it you can still pass the paper.
Its because examiner will open the question with a very general approach :
Example : What is the key criteria for a perfect restaurant ?
So if you know a releavant model / framework you can apply but if you don't its still ok to give general answers but of course examiner will be more rewarding when comes to those who knew more about the syllabus content.
If you have good general knowledge P3 is a very interesting paper but if you don't have to rely on practice & memory power.



This post has been edited by Topace111: Feb 10 2009, 11:35 PM

Strictly speaking i dont think KSA & MCO cater much to cat students compared to their acca programmes.
CAT is meant more for students to study themselves. Thats why i think sunway can help in this category.
Last time lecturer used to have continuity :
Example : The lecturer who teached F6 will also teach tax in cat that same goes with F7, F8, F9 & F5 as well.
Sadly very few lecturers did it (lack of fees, student & very lower level stuff)

One thing i don't like about cat lecturer is their constant remark about how difficult is of the advance acca level stuff......bla bla....
When at cat also when i bump into other "senior" student studying part 2 or 3 they always have a constant smug looking at their face carrying their thick part 3 books around brrrr. Its not that we cannot reach their level but just no there yet.

I will normally use that as last resort, usually just stomach it.
By the way what is the normal time they release result via email.
My yahoo account always received later than evreyone else (48 hours late that is !!!)

It depends on you, if you want the extra edge you need to look for it.
I have develop an analogy to describe this situation.
If you are a house-wive and you only want the best facility & service with little regard to pricing so go KLCC shopping = Sunway
If you are a house-wife and you really cling on to the principle "value for money" so you will scout around all hypermarkets = tesco, jusco, giant, carrefour to scout for the best quality material at a reasonable price = taking at Kl centre(s)

Just don't ask me which hypermarket reflect which Kl centres

If i am not mistaken both sheila & phillip have very thick notes & even larger crowd of students.
S i choose the alternative lecturer who focused more on technique and writing skill.
F8 requires few knowledge but needs a very strong foundation in how to answer the exam format. (steps, framework.......)
Thats why many of those who have worked in audit line before told me F8 is even harder for them compared to P7
not because they don't WHAT to answer but rather HOW to answer them.

Now i am even more afraid with my result.

I wish the best in luck to those who are waiting for their Dec 08 result & may god bless you (if you believe in one)
May those whom expect to fail = pass
May those who aim high = may your wish comes true
May those whom just wants to get through = your expectations will be fulfilled

Whoa i can finally access after 30 brute force attempt.
I pass all 3 core papers whew after 2 stinking months of waiting and yesterday sleepless night.
3 down 2 more to go.

Good luck everyone else

I was hooked on the computer screen sincce 9am looking for any signs (wake up at around 6am slept at around 3am)
Shouldn't have that damn "bak kut teh" for dinner coupled with my depression = insomnia tonic.
Anyway i am totally free now. Very scared to go back to P2 again.

Since you are willing to make voluntary disclosure i also felt compelled to do the same
P1 = 62
P2 = 53
P3 = 70

All the friends i known have higher P2 marks than me. ACCA is really unpredictable = worse than forecasting shares market
One more thing is it hard to do OBU ?

This post has been edited by Topace111: Feb 16 2009, 01:44 PM

P1 is tricky ?
Perhaps so in the future since most of my friends that did it in the first 2 seatings all pass. Anyway the first 2 seating always the lenient gap for new papers. I think your friends also carried that notion.

I am quite satisfied that i can manage to approach the exam in consistent manner.
Congrats to those who have passed & those who didn't don't be despaired & strive harder on the current round.

The thing with audit is simply described in these sentences : Its simple but not easy
What i mean is that the question can be quite direct compared to the past (which is very misleading). However now you need to write more to gain the marks since examiner has been very direct with his approach.

That said if one word is misplaced your entire structure can be wrong.
No elaboration / very few explanation can also result in huge loss of the chunks of marks.

Last time they may ask like this "Describe audit procedure in relating to statement above" so students need to analyse which one and how to apply so marks will be easily given if students get the point.

Now they will ask like this "Describe steps in audit procedure in relating debtors to statement above"
Since now its rather clear & specific student need to explain a lot more than usual to gain those extra marks.

My approach in audit also follows the same principle as above :
simple = clear to the point
not easy = write more explanations to elaborate on the point above.

do you mean they score high marks in all papers or
they scored high marks and also failed some papers (because i don't know how they will feel in those circumstances)

Anyway i think consistency does matter more, just look at sports since awards are normally bestowed on those who are consistent rather than a glimpse of brilliance (Nadal in tennis & tiger in golf) . That cannot be said about entertainment though especially oscar awards = on film basis.

Ha ha my english is quite average by comparison.
Actually i plan to reserve the OBU after my exam in june.
I have 2.5 mths gap period for the results & I DONT PLAN TO WORK so quickly yet. Once start working life effectively gone.....
Anyway if i pass the remaining 2 papers & work after that , my relatives will not be pleased. Some of my cousins are few years older than me but i MAY end up the fastest to graduate. So their parents will be (well you know the picture)

I do have some specific questions :
1) How hard is it to get grades for OBU (is A difficult to obtained ?)
2) Since you mentioned you have been working, do you enter Big 4 or 5, is the entry requirement difficult ?

I also had met infos that need to be clarified =
PWC = recognise & will bond student if they belong to (TAR, Sunway, PAAC or MCO), FTMS had been excluded
E&Y = only sunway
SO my question is if i do not fall into those range will be it difficult to be accepted. All my uncles told me you need recommendation but all of them are in engineering consultancy firm. But i do have quite a number of relatives in PWC b4.

I had just come back from partying whew
Apparently many people stuck with audit & they have endless discussion why they should pass. Anyway they are happy they manage to get through with the others.

Just a short reunion dinner to discuss some acca things.
The pass rate should be made available in 1-2 weeks time.
I don't think i will need the e-mail thing again, as usual they come up 2 hours after acca unfreeze the blockage for online viewing.

At first i heard a lot of good things being said about lewin in audit in the beginning (Catherine was quite notorious with ambiguous question).
Can anyone give review / preview about P4 lecturer. I heard a lot of profanity being used about him during his early days as P4 lecturer.

Welcome to ACCA. Don't worry there are more in store