F5 knowledge for P5

I think the second approach is by far the best. Go back to F5 when you need to.

On the ACCA website, there is P5 technical article called “Moving up from paper F5 to Paper P5.

If you Google it, it should answer all your questions.

A few points from it……..

Since Paper P5 builds on Paper F5, the examiner could assume you know all of the Paper F5 topics. In practice, the examiner is unlikely to examine Paper F5 topics in detail unless they are also specifically included within the syllabus for Paper P5 too. It is advisable however to have a good knowledge of certain areas of the Paper F5 syllabus before starting to study Paper P5. The areas of particular importance are as follows:

activity-based costing
budgeting
decision making
performance measurement.

Activity-based costing, which is in Section A1 of the Paper F5 syllabus, feeds into activity-based management in the Paper P5 syllabus. Some activity?based management questions in Paper P5 exams have required candidates to perform calculations using activity?based costing principles, so it is important to have a good knowledge of this area.

The other specialist cost and management accounting techniques included in the Paper F5 syllabus which are also relevant to Paper P5 are target costing, lifecycle costing and environmental management accounting. However, as these are specifically included within the Paper P5 syllabus, candidates should be able to refresh and increase their knowledge of these from their Paper P5 materials.

Budgeting is another important area. In Paper P5, the focus is on whether budgets are a useful tool or not, and which types of budget are useful in what situations. It is useful, therefore, to be familiar with the following budgeting sections from Paper F5 syllabus:

C1 – Budgetary systems
C2 – Types of budget
C8 – Performance analysis and behavioural aspects