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Hi All,
I have asked similar question in P4 forum, but various people read various forums so I have decided to ask here as well.
1. Is it a realistic expectation to prepare for P5 exam in just 2 months ? (studying online + working full time).
2. Is it more difficult than P4 or P6?
I got exemptions from F1-F9. I studied material from F5 to F9 and I found it ok at that time. I hated F7…Obviously I do not remember anything from these exams now. Later I sat P1 (got 52%, first sitting – the most boring subject ever) and P3 (59% first sitting – quite ok, logical). These two exams were ok for me in general.
Then I sat P2 and it felt like hitting a truck that was speeding 100 miles per hour and then being run over by a tank twice! I failed in my first sitting :-(.
I sat it again this December and currently waiting for results. I found P2 very difficult as a subject overall. There are a lot of details to remember and tricky questions. It requires hours & hours of study and when you finish you realise that you have forgotten half of it so you need to start from the beginning. It was much harder than anything else I have ever studied in my life.Anyway I am thinking about my next steps and I can’t decide between P4 or P5. I do not want to step on a landmine like P2 again.
Is P5 similar in nature to P2 or is it perhaps more straightforward and easier to learn? How is it compared to all lower papers? F5 was ok for me, but I do not remember any calculations/theory from it now.
I know that P5 is kind of based on P3 which was ok for me, but I have been reading very strange comments/opinions about this exam and about the examiner. I am worried that as a non-native speaker of English I may fail big time.
I currently work as Accountant – mainly in mgmt accounting. I have always been a first class student, but based on my P2 experience it seems that it does not matter so I lost my confidence completely.
What would you recommend?
Thanks
From what I’ve gathered from other students, P4 would most correspond to the ‘Landmine’ which you mentioned in regards to P2.
I’ve done both papers. Passed P4 Sep 16 session and P5 in Dec 16 session. The two papers are very different. P4 I suppose is similar to P2 in the sense that it is very technical and you need to understand everything in order to complete calculations and written questions. P4 is quite mathematical and a lot of computations are required although some are straight forward but very time consuming others are complex and again time consuming. It is a difficult paper but all option papers are difficult I guess. It’s all about practice with P4.
P5 is very different to P4 there are very little calculations required and where there are calculations they tend to be straight forward just time consuming. The content is a little similar to P3 and in fact there is a lot of overlapping areas such as Porters 5 forces, mendelows matrix, SWOT etc.. I did not find the actual content of P5 difficult (opposite to P4), instead I found the trick was with the questions and making sure you interpret and answer the question correctly. If you liked P3 then P5 could be a better option for you but don’t fall in to the pitfall of answering P5 questions in the same way as those in P3 which I did on first attempt (and failed). You must answer the questions focusing on performance measurement/management instead of a business analytics perspective.
In summary both papers are difficult each in a different way. I probably spent more time on P4 because it is very technical and complex but everyone has different capabilities. I hope this helps and good luck.
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