*** F5 June 2012 Exam was … Comments and Instant Poll ***

@nenor said:

“That’s not possible. You make 100,000 units at 0.5 hours each, that’s 50,000 hours spent. The other 50,000 hours can create 50,000/0.75 hours = 66,666.67 units, and the rest are outsourced.

But the product that took 0.5 hours incurred the most cost for the company. The question asked us to minimize the cost didn’t it? So you would produce the cheaper product first using the 75,000 hours (100,000 / 0.75) leaving 25,000 hours left for the other product. This meant you could only produce 50,000 and would have to outsource the other 50,000. That’s the way I interpreted it.

How do u do the variance question?
Do we flex the budget to 960 and compare with the actual figures of 960?
I didn’t use the market share thing

@angleo86 said:
But the product that took 0.5 hours incurred the most cost for the company. The question asked us to minimize the cost didn’t it? So you would produce the cheaper product first using the 75,000 hours (100,000 / 0.75) leaving 25,000 hours left for the other product. This meant you could only produce 50,000 and would have to outsource the other 50,000. That’s the way I interpreted it.

Hmm, not sure where you got it that the product using 0.75h incurs less cost than the one using 0.5 hours. Clearly one unit of the product using 0.75h cost has incremental cost 0.75 cent, while 1 unit of the other product has incremental cost 0.50. In the end it’s all the same, since you either outsource 50,000 units * 0.5 hours = 25,000 hours = 25,000 dollars or you outsource 33,333.33 units * 0.75 hours = 25,000 hours = 25,000 dollars. The question seems to be pretty fucked up, without having contribution, so that we can compare contribution per limiting factor of both products…

Personally, I took a leap of faith during the exam and assumed the outsourcing prices as a reference price, deducted variable costs and checked for contribution per limiting factor that way. Not entirely sure if that was intended, though. Now it seems to me that we just had to examine the two possible scenarios and see that whatever we outsource, the incremental cost would be the same in both cases.

And about the variances – I think I fucked up there, since I didn’t get any of those to match. The sales quantity variance I got was 40 units (1000-960) * 44 contribution = 1760 (A). It was something else there. Material price + material usage also did not reconcile to total material variance given in the question.

I have been preparing for an exam very hard. I have solved all problems in exam kit, I have done past papers for last 4-5 years. And what have I got here in June (while re-sitting f5 again?) THE DISASTER!!
Q1. As I suppose it was to calculate all relevant costs for in-house manufacturing and compare it with price suggested by the outsourcer, but that was not so trivial you know. I have completly ignored depriciation as it ‘s non cash flow and as a result NOT relevant. Material just to adjust on figure of % given. Labour without change. I was confused by machining costs.. Concerning heat costs I took just a part which was not fixed and occure only for production.
Q2. very “interesting” – easy marks for part A and part B and lost marks for C and D. really cant imagine what actually Anny wanted us to write..
Q3. WTF? I have been reading part A twice or maybe even 3 times.. and just put it off.. part 5 is pretty easy to write smth about subjectivity, bad managing decisions, non motivation.. etc
Q4. Really good first part. But I still think if I had to calculate plan.and oper.Var. , and most likely YES, but I did not. Part B (TQM vs Standard costing..) no, thanks.
Q5. ROI and RI. Firstly was confused by the very small result and big decrease of ratios , finally figured out about “annual” and recalculated. But again I dont think the part about new investment was easy.. no..

Overall I think I just wasted my time again. But unfortunetaly I even cant imag how to improve the preparation to pass it finaly. I did really best this time but I am pretty sure that not 50 marks I ll get .. –35-45// (((

I heard the previous examiner was sacked because the pass rate was too low. Certainly this one should be sacked as well

Hello Acca fellows
I am reading comments since the 12th evening and I did not see anyone saying “I did well”. Even those guys that think the paper was fair said they are not sure about passing. I missed last year exam and because of that I had lot of time for studying. I really cover everything was in Kaplan book plus 8 past papers and I felt confident about passing with a good mark.

We are about 200 people here. How can we write a complain as someone suggested before?

About my exam: I try to solve all the questions a part from the n. 3 as most people in this forum. If you check Kaplan book you’ll find only 1 page about Time series (multiplicative model). I watched most of open tuition Lectures and there was a quick explanation about addictive and multiplicative model. What I am trying to say is that this part of the paper was considered “not important” and I would never expect a full question on it. This question stoles us 10 marks at least!

My only concern is: if Kaplan is considered “official publisher” how is it possible that one full question was covered in such a shallow way?
Also did ACCA examiners read what publishers write in the books? I can think only 2 answers and no one of these is positive for ACCA
1) Acca don’t read the books ( how ACCA can say that Kaplan is an authorised publisher)
2) Acca read the book (Did they put the 3rd question on purpose?)
I am fed up with the material because material should cover everything with plenty of examples.

I think I will score between 40-43 and 55.
ROI and Target Costing were achievable questions (for those that did not see before TQM, it was in F2 as well and the question was not about TQM but about “space for Standard Costing in a TQM environment”).
The first question was ok a part from the limiting factor part (there were not Price or contribution to rank. Even if you know the cost how can you rank without price?)
The variance question was confusing. I took the actual data from the “junior accountant analysis” and ignored all the other data because I think they were there just to trick us.

Good luck to everybody who studied hard. I hope they will increase the marks.

I thought it was easy, wouldnt be suprised if i got 80-90%

I think I am pretty good at main areas of the subject. But I didnt earn my 50 marks. That’s not fair! Time is money, Anny…I dont want to spent a 0.5 year again waiting for a re-sit..

I also thought about feedbacks on Anny but I am not sure where I have to send them.

Please fill in the survey ASAP and urge any other ACCA F5 students to do the same.
If hundreds of us fill this in and voice our view on unfair syllabus coverage, may be this will have some effect, if not on this exam, then at least on December session questions.

I must say I’m leaning toward Ted Baker who thinks it was quite easy. By no means do I think I did well but that’s solely down to a lack of preparation and leaving it till the last day to hit the books. I understood all the questions and with a bit more time I would have made sure the things I knew I got right to pick up as many marks as possible but instead I rushed and made silly mistakes. I really can’t believe so many people who claim to have spent hours revising struggled and surely after all these years you’d be stupid to think you could spot pick the topics?
As much as I’d like to have passed to save me the hassle of retakes, if I fail and get 30% plus ill be happy knowing that next time ill just cover the topics I didnnt focus on this time and ill have everything covered.
Also, these forums are meant for people who either want to complain or want confirmation when they’re not sure if they did something right or not – how many people that pass bother to come on here ansd rub everyones noses in it?

I think main issue is the study materials. I studied for F5 with Kaplan in addition with a revision kit from BPP and tbh there isn’t enough questions to practise Ann Iron’s style.

May be places like Kaplan or BPP could update their materials accordingly – considering they are charging significant amounts to students.

Also when I’ve read their exam tips – I cannot see how they can advice / expect ABC while I remember examiner stating that she’s not going to ask ABC just for the sake of it.

My main issue with F5 was the tuition and materials as I rely on them. They weren’t up to date and were reflecting past papers rather than new examiner in my opinion.

@burnz0 said:
I really can’t believe so many people who claim to have spent hours revising struggled and surely after all these years you’d be stupid to think you could spot pick the topics?

Also, these forums are meant for people who either want to complain or want confirmation when they’re not sure if they did something right or not – how many people that pass bother to come on here ansd rub everyones noses in it?

First of all, if you would please refrain from irritating us all with your unfounded and ridiculous “doubts” (“claim to have spent hours revising”? – you BET!!!)

Secondly, a little more respect towards your fellow students would be appropriate. If you bothered to actually read the posts carefully enough, you would have seen what your fellow students have perceived as being unfair.
Nothing to do with question-spotting.

To me personally, the narrow coverage of syllabus was a major issue.

I have no idea what you do, but I work in the industry.
ACCA is supposed to be about hands-on, applicable knowledge, covering wide variety of issues.
How is applicability of standards in TQM environment relevant to ANY of us, is unclear to me.
The differences between manufacturing and services? -seriously? – how useful is our ability to distinguish the characteristics of these?
I very much doubt that target costing in NHS scenario has any use in real life either.
The reason that the above questions / knowledge are not relevant to real life is because these questions are “made up” out of narrow and perhaps even obsolete areas of syllabus.

And finally, with regards to your comment that the students only come here to complain…
Well, as you know (or don’t?), statistics don’t lie.
Have a look at the identical polls conducted for Dec 11 or Jun 11 sittings… they are still on this website, have a look and see the difference.
(or perhaps, miraculously, many more moaners came online this June compared to June 2011?)

Good luck with your results.
If you have been as inventive in your assumptions about the scenarios in the exam as you have been on this forum, I would not be surprised if you passed.

But I, for once, would not be celebrating even if I DO pass, as I was going to tackle P5 next, and now I lost all my motivation to go ahead with the subject.

I’m only joking it was bloody hard. Be suprised if I passed.