*** ACCA P1 December 2016 Exam was.. Instant Poll and comments ***

I found the exam very very time pressured. There were allot of easy questions, but was hard to apply the basic knowledge to the actual scenario. Really hoping i scrape a pass.

what was question 1(d) i ?

Does anyone remember

I thought Questions 2,3 & 4 were all reasonable it was relatively easy to apply technical knowledge.
– COSO
– Integrated Reporting
– Professional ethics
– Relativism

There were a few strange elements in Q1 though, not sure if I scored any marks for the letter question (apart from the 4 professional marks for layout!). I just couldn’t work out what they wanted me to do!

Fingers crossed for a kind marker 🙂

In all honesty the exam was not hard but they expect students to lose their hands. How much shall you write!!!

I did question 4 first. Ethical threats alot of self interest going on fairly straight forward.

Then i went onto the monster. I spent too long on unitary board that the time was ticking i cudnt write much for the letter. Was rather confusing what to write anyways.

So lastly question i just put pen to paper so my chances are slim of passing. Gutted. Why is time management such a issue for me!

The exam was semi ok . I did questions obv 1 , 2 and 4

I finished everything within 3 hours… Probably i didn’t write enough???

My threats were

Self Review
Intimidation
Familiarity – “assumed he developed a close relationship with the FD”

For the Information Question

I wrote out the qualities of good information then explained why it was important

Question 1 – I explained the benefits of having the two tiered board but then explained the disadvantages. Then stated that the non execs although qualified in terms of financial reporting, they did not have the requisite knowledge of the core activities.

Then since control management and strategic objective development such structures act as a barrier for effective communication etc etc

Internal Controls

Failed to prevent and detect fraud and error
Failed to safeguard the “assets”
Failed to detect deviations from the agreed Risk Appetite

Exactly… I just wrote back what I put in part b

Just said he should have disclosed his interest
Asked an independent accountant to review the accounts to get their findings
Consult with relevant internal authorities (compliance officer) or if they are aware of the activities the appropriate external authorities .. eg regulatory authorities.

Is that writing the letter to shareholders about importance of corporate governance reporting? 10marks I didn’t know what to write : (

I thought it was an OK paper overall. Quite time pressured, really struggle to write so much though.

For the institutional investors, I wrote about the fact that using mendelow matrix, they have high power/interest, so key players and then explained that SCC by being transparent led to them thinking about long term and not leaving with short ten issues. If they do leave, then giving their stakeholding away could lead to big impact on share price. Support: related it to their shareholder activism.

For question 2 and the objectives I wrote about the objectives and how shank had not each them, I wrote about the coso as well as prevention and detection of fraud and timeliness of financial information. The agency theory was OK
For the information but listed the 8 characteristics and then related some to monitoring the system as well as being managed on firm. The ethics was in, just stated that fraud would never be the correct outcomeoutcome especially as fortune may end up in financial difficulties.

I chose q4, spoke about the ethical issues. Misread part b. And refered to fundamental principals, instead of independence. Still did the safeguards.. Would I still get marks for this? Part c was ethical dilemma resolution, spoke about gaining facts, establishing ethical issues, refer to principals, looking at internal procedures, looking at alternative courses of actions, then speaking to relevant people inside and outside firm and then if not resolved withdrawing from role.

God I can’t believe a lot of people have had the same problems. I felt in Q4 that the B and C was the same! The a was about ethical threats although worth 10 marks there were only 3 threats!! But I felt b and c I repeated my self. Q1d the letter I can not justify 18 marks!!! I didn’t understand what they wanted

@danistephens said:
I thought Questions 2,3 & 4 were all reasonable it was relatively easy to apply technical knowledge.
– COSO
– Integrated Reporting
– Professional ethics
– Relativism

There were a few strange elements in Q1 though, not sure if I scored any marks for the letter question (apart from the 4 professional marks for layout!). I just couldn’t work out what they wanted me to do!

Fingers crossed for a kind marker 🙂

When you say COSO are you referring to the “risk framework” question? I answered with ALARP, in hindsight probably not what they were looking for as this is a principle rather than a framework :(Didnt cop it at the time. Hopefully I get one or two marks anyway! Was this a 6 mark question do you recall?

Hi Chives,

Yep that was for the Risk Framework, think it was 8 marks maybe? Wasn’t sure if COSO was the correct approach as I could only briefly mention each of the points (I ran through the COI-MICRA steps), probably rushed it a bit buttried to relate to the scenario where poss!

Anyone else thinks that Q4 marking scheme was flawed?

The first requirement handed 10 marks with only 3 ethical threats identifiable in the scenario while the last requirement asking for an ethical decision model rewarded 5 marks, misleading us to use Tucker model whereas AAA model was more appropriate.