APM*** December 2021 ACCA APM exam – Instant Poll and comments ***

Ok?

Got the Hospital, Bus and Cleaning company questions. Hospital and Bus both being not for profit organisations really minimised what was examinable. Feel like I learned so many things that had no relevance to any of the questions. It wasn't a disaster but a bit repetitive and I would have liked a bit more variety. Touch and go whether I passed, time management was tough. What did everybody else think?

Q1 PEST analysis (suggest suitable measures only for S) BSC (assess the given measure whether they are suitable for the given objectives and mission) Bonus scheme Q Management information at the three levels Q2 A Score assessment of a company Problems of qualitative measures such as A score Q3 EMA costs types input output analysis Life cycle costing evaluation for a given product Wow this was such a challenging paper I felt it had too much information (some which were not needed IMO) and made it confusing to understand what was being asked in the first place The questions were challenging because it was not direct through the requirement but was embedded in the scenario and mostly hidden and hard to identify with all the surrounding information. How did you guys feel? Anyone else got these questions??

I got the same paper, thought it was a fair paper overall! Hope that I have wrote about the right things! My mind went completely blank for the first question on performance measures for social factors lol

Hey can anyone brief out the question with the marks weightage please... much appreciated...

same here,hospital and bus.but what about the 3rd question.I mean oh my god,i read it like 10 times and i couldn’t tell what it was being asked.my second attempt.on september the topics were so perfectly fine i knew everything and tried it at least,i had time management issue and attempted 89 and got 45 but i knew what was the problem where i was not correct ,why i missed time etc.December attempt was such a disaster ,what happened ,so many hours of studying for nothing .very very disappointed

I didn't know what was going on with Q3. Was really hoping for a corporate failure question so disappointed it didn't show up in my exam, although I see it did for some people.

I had the same, hospital, bus company and cleaning company. Overall I thought it would have been ok if: a) the information was not a complete overload. To get through everything in the time given is just unrealistic. I don’t buy ACCAs explanations that it’s to resemble real-life deadlines. Not enough time to make my answers coherent, just no time to think. b) the requirements are all over the place - why not have just one exhibit with the requirements, why do they have to have at least 2-3 different ones? It makes it difficult to understand what is being asked as we have to jump between exhibits on a screen that looks like it belongs in the 90s. Or, alternatively, let us use multiple screens like we would at work. Overall, I don’t expect a pass, and I’m completely exhausted. My last exam too…

Exactly the same here. Not had to read question 3 a good 10 times to understand what was being asked. Found myself also saying in my answers that insufficient data was also provided to reach a logical conclusion and that more data is needed, particularly for the hospital question where the data given was pathetic.

Q1 - hospital question Q2 - cleaning company Q3 - bal scorecard and bus kpi Like the general consensus this paper had a lot of information to read and digest. More than the usual APM paper involves. This meant switching between appendixes time and again. Most of time just trying to read and re read again and again to ensure I don't miss anything Q3 about kpi just horrible ,they have kpi and I am not sure if we had to evaluate it or impact on the kpi due to change of hybrid bus... Rushed that ques in 25 mins..no way enough time to do justice Also I felt this exam was a very topical exam..did anyone notice question 1 was subtly asking about corona virus as T3 and they mentioned the 30 day recovery period and if anyone survived..and also impact on hospitals which would be the nhs in the UK or any hospital in the world.. Definitely real life issues in recent times tested here

Hey I had the same paper. I was extremely disappointed. I spend so much time learning everything and like you agree that it was all a bit too repeated. I def would have liked more variety. Also the questions were quite heavy in terms of points not broken down as much as i have seen in the past papers. I dont think ive done that well i had to rush through the Bus question as i got a bit flustered but lets see. Goodluck

I had the hospital, bus company and cleaning company questions. I agree, it was difficult to understand what was being asked for. Requirements were in within the exhibits. I copied the requirements onto the word processor just to be in touch with it while framing my response. Other than that, it was easy for me overall. A lot of what was being asked for were repetitions from previous year papers.

For those who got Radacal and Environmental costing may I know what you wrote about bonus schemes, performance measures for SOCIAL and on the overall Environmental costing question.

Hey question 1 last part ..did they ask for information at three levels or 3 types of information for the strategic level?

parthwadhwa007 wrote:Hey can anyone brief out the question with the marks weightage please… much appreciated…

I can't remember the breakdown for Q1 but for Q2/Q2: Q2 A Score assessment of a company 15 points Problems of qualitative measures such as A score 10 points Q3 EMA costs types 8 points input output analysis 9 points Life cycle costing evaluation for a given product 8 points

First question was based on a NFPO hospital - Performance management and management problems with NFPO - Value for money - League table Second question cleaning company - Hopwood’s management style and how it can be applied to the company’s divisions -Evaluate the use of ROI and RI Third was a bus company -Analyse new KPIs without suggesting yours - Balance scorecard advantages

Hi i'm a student from Sri Lanka, First Question - Radacal Co which tested PEST & BSC Second question - Perfromance pyramid and types of information Third Question - Types of management appraisal. Very limited scope, i felt that there were many repetitives in m answer. Like in BSC & performance pyramid.

Yes. AS SOMEONE FROM A COUNTRY IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH I WAS SO DISAPPOINTED. I WENT ON AND JUST MENTIONED INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY CONCERNS. ALSO I HATED THIS PAPER WITH THE ENTIRETY OF MY BEING.

It is highly subjective marking and that's why 70% of us might fail.

For increasing product range,I mentioned the number of new products launched.I don 't remember the other two SOCIAL factors.

For the ones who did any life cycle costing calculations what was the answer you got? I got a profit of 0.2 using life cycle costing for the whole period when compared to the previous which was 15 if I can remember right

Anybody that did the new operating profit calculation for the bus question, old one was 190,000. New one I got 192,000, anybody else remember their answers?

What did you guys write for the information question which asked about the 3 types of information And also regarding the input output analysis question ?

For the VFM question in Q1 Airbus, what measures did you all write for Economy, Effectiveness and Efficiency?

For the Bonus scheme Q what did you writr

ranganaherath wrote:For the Bonus scheme Q what did you writr

Management was 2 parts: 1) achievement of customer satisfaction and 2) profit or something I answered: Clear: not clear what success of survey means? Not specific enough. 3 out of 5? 4 out of 5? Controllable: customer satisfaction influenced by many things. Manager doesn't have control over what other departments do. Profit (or whatever it was) Clear: I think it was clear Controllable: again, influenced by many factors Motivation: management and non-management both get 5%/10% bonus. That's not motivating for management. They have more responsibility and should get higher bonus. Non-management: I think it was something like profit or revenues for their retail unit. Clear: clear only if they set a specific profit goal each year. Controllable: no. Could be due to many factors, e.g. bad economy, bad location of retail shop Motivating: yes. 5%/10% is motivating Conclusion: don't adopt because not clear/controllable. But current scheme also not great.

I found the exam difficult due to the time pressures involved I have due to a previous injury very limited movement in 2 fingers in my right hand. This means I am a slow typer but fine with writing When Acca went cbe it has basically disadvantaged me and I seriously think I won’t pass the last exams An extra allotted 30 minutes won’t make any difference These exams are very time consuming as it is, moving from hand written to cbe while might suiting others means I struggle badly. But that’s the acca, money mad

PEST analysis (suggest suitable measures only for S) BSC (assess the given measure whether they are suitable for the given objectives and mission) Bonus scheme Q Management information at the three levels Q2 A Score assessment of a company Problems of qualitative measures such as A score Q3 EMA costs types input output analysis Life cycle costing evaluation for a given product can anyone provide answers of these questions