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Hi Trephena
I’ll just use an rough example for my question so that I don’t drown it too many words.
The main principle requires division of responsibilities at the head of the company (Code, 2016, s.1.1). To this end, the roles of Chairman and CEO should be seperated (Code, 2016, s.1.3).
Does the second reference need have “author, date” in this case or just the section will suffice?
hi , please can someone explain or tell me how to arrange my references in alphabetical order . Each time I try to use word to arrange it messes the whole references .
Hi,
Please help me with Harvard reference.
When I refer information on the research company website and there is no author, do I treat the company as an author? When I cite into the project, do I just put as (Company’s name, date)?
If the annual report is prepared for financial year 2016 and published in 2017, do I put the year as 2017?
Many thanks
@saifudeen -probably the first version as in the list the family name should come first. Also I think the markers would prefer the version that has the actual link to the article – the ebscohost.com link is just to a generic website and not particularly useful.
@alejandra -that seems fine as the Code is like legislation so no author is required. If you were referencing to it generally FRC + year is an acceptable alternative
@bigbig – most of the first bit is covered indirectly in the Open Tuition Ultimate Guide to Referencing your RAP (on our homepage) with the examples I give for Marks and Spencer
With annual reports it is the last date of the year it covers – so year end 31 Dec 2016 would be 2016 and year end 31 March 2017 would be 2017. Other company documents e.g. special announcements and press briefings are the actual publication date.
Hi Trephena,
Thanks for your help.
I have checked the Golden Rules in the home page. However, I still have some questions in regards to Rule 7, I have quoted it below:
‘7. The information provided in the text should be sufficient to locate the exact document It is therefore unacceptable just to list a ubiquitous website address such as http://www.marksandspencer.com If you have used information from a specific document then you need to provide the link for the marker e.g.
https://corporate.marksandspencer.com/investors/153855a7b7b24038920758283d6986fa
The reference in the text may have been (M & S, 2015) and therefore in accordance with Rule 5 you must show M & S (2015) in your reference list but you should follow this with an explanation of what the document is e.g Annual report 2015, followed by the link and the latest date you accessed it. (Note if you used Marks & Spencer in the text then you MUST use Marks & Spencer in your list and not randomly decide to change t to M & S see Rule 5).’On this rule, it says when M&S annual report is used, we show (M&S, 2015) in the text and in the list we add Annual report 2015, link and access date. However, what if there are some other resources from M&S website are used, do we still cite in the text as (M&S, date). The question I tried to ask is whether this will cause confusion. If (M&S, 2015) appears several times in the text, does the marker know which information is refereed. Are we required to show specific information, for example, (M&S press, 2015), (M&S annual report, 2015)?
Sorry for asking this long question, I hope I have made myself clear.
Many thanks.
@bigbig While you wait for Trephena’s response, perhaps rule no.4 might help you. It says
Each different document referred to must have its own unique designator If for example you are using several different articles from the same newspaper in the same year you MUST distinguish between the various articles. You do this by using ‘appendages’ added to the year e.g. 2015(a), 2015(b) 2015(c). If during the course of your work you refer to the same document more than once then you should always use the same designator as used previously (so do not change it to a different appendage from the one given originally).
If you google havard referencing multiple works by same author same year it will give the same advice. I hope this helps a bit.
@alejandra Thanks for answering my questions.
Please correct me if I am wrong. For example, M&S published annual report, press and conference presentation in 2016. Do I show (M&S, 2016(a)), (M&S, 2016(b)) and (M&S, 2016(c)) when I cite in the text, then I put full details in the list, for example M&S, 2016(a). annual report. [Online]. Available at: URL (Accessed: date)? Am I correct in saying that?
In addition, is it recommended to show reference list in the same work document as RAP or in a separate one?
Many thanks.
Yes: the three different documents will have different letters. (M&S, 2016a) (M&S, 2016b) etc
Yes in the reference list you put the full details of what the document is.
I also hope that you understood the part where she says a document needs only appear once in the reference list (for example, even if you cite the 2016 annual report 20 times in-text in the reference list it must appear once)
This site might help you. https://libweb.anglia.ac.uk/referencing/harvard.htm on how to cite other documents.
Trephena says the key is consistency.
The reference list should be a seperate file. See page 65 of the information pack which tells us what to upload and in which format we must do it.
P.S. I am also a student like you. So please verify everything I tell you.
@alejandra, Many thanks for your reply. I am now much clearer, good luck to your project 🙂
Please can anyone advise step by step or send a link i can follow .I am unable to arrange my reference list alphabetically.
secondly if we quote from the annual report is it enough to say like M&S ,2015 or i have to say( M&S Annual Report ,2015)Well done alejandra – I couldn’t have answered it better myself (so top of the class and a gold star!) 😀
If anyone cans answer about the arranging alphabetically query please do! (The only sure way I know is cutting and pasting – it is time consuming however. But then having done a Reference list for my Masters that was 11 pages long in the days BEFORE being able to do the entries via an automated method where everything had to be entered manually was really hard work so by comparison a bit of final cut and paste sounds a synch!)
M&S 2015 is fine in the text as long as this is the only 2015 document you are citing – otherwise please read the Golden Rules (No. 4 cited above by alejandra) from the Open Tuition Ultimate Guide to Referencing your RAP -see our homepage http://www.opentuition.com/obu
for the full version of this.@saifuddin please can you tell me which one did u use , citethisforme ?Does it arrange it alphabetically too .
please guide me .I failed last time too only because of referencing .@erumrk, the way I sort the list alphabrtically is by adding a line between each reference, and then the list theoretically has several paragraphs, after that, you can sort it by paragraph.
I hope this is helpful.
@erumrk
I just started referencing …and I have no idea about how to do it alphabetically. I asked in another forum for help.Thanks @bigbig ,I worked it out on the same lines and paragraphing is key ,then word sorts it out .
In the reference list, how do we deal with the full name of the abbreviated in-text citation. Is it Harvard to do it as below? I searched high and low and couldn’t find consistent advice. Most started with the full term which would be inconsitent with in-text.
FRC [Financial Reporting Council] (2016). The UK Corporate Governance Code. London: The Financial Reporting Council Limited. Available at: <website address>
Hi All,
I need some advice regarding OBU submission.
I am planning to submit OBU thesis in current submission which will be close in 5 days. I have already wrote my thesis but its not final yet and making final changes as my mentor suggested me.
But the problem is this is my last and final attempt for OBU submission and I am submitting thesis on GSK as my main company and AstraZeneca as its competitor. Both companies have different presentation currencies. GSK presentation currency is GBP and AstraZeneca presentation currency is USD.
What I basically did in my ratio analysis I have taken USD translated FS of GSK and compare it with audited and I found no differences therefore I calculated my ratios for GSK on the basis of translated FS.
But I was reading some comments here in the forum in which it is mentioned that translated FS should not be used for RAP instead published FS should be used as ratio analysis eradicate the need of translated FS. However, in my analysis, at some places I had to mention exchange rate fluctuation as a reason for fluctuation in ratios because I used translated FS.
This made me confused at the last moment and it seems that my thesis will not going to pass in this final attempt because I should have use published FS and just need to translate share price at year end rate for competitor.
Please advise me what should I do now. Should I submit with translated FS ratio analysis or should I try to change all the ratios and try to make changes in my thesis by using published FS then submit if I will be able to incorporate all changes before deadline?
Early advice would really help me.
.If you don’t have time to change things completely then you will have to stick with most of what you have got I suppose and try to make the best of a bad job – I suggest in the analysis you try to play down currency fluctuations and try to remove some of the obvious anomalies.
So in a nutshell, try to appreciate the issues you may currently have and try to deal with the worst areas in the short time you have left.
Remember currency fluctuations will not have impacted much on GSK’s UK sales but by translating them into USD and then comparing them your will have introduced a difference that does not really exist for some of the sales figures (if UK sales are significant then this issue is more serious than where most of the sales are made overseas).
The main issue comes in the trends. With elements like debtor and payable days using different currency rates for each year means that changes in your trends are not necessarily due to any improvements by management (or conversely anything they have done wrong) but could just be a consequence of the forex rate used for each year (similarly with inventory). This in term may impact on the current ratio. Although debt to equity for one year should be OK again making comparisons year on year are unsound and between companies because of the forex.
You said this is your final attempt – do you mean it is submission no. 3 or you have reached the 10 year limit, or both? If you can submit in P36 within the rules I would actually suggest you rework the lot and resubmit next May as that way you would have time to improve it. As long as your previous attempt was on the same company you will not have to go for one of the new sector companies introduced for P35 and P36 as you do not have to resubmit straightaway.
Generally though students need to recognise that ratio analysis obviates the need for currency translation as you are comparing ratio with ratio (therefore the actual currency behind each is irrelevant) however by translating currencies and then turning them into ratios you introduce artificial differences which could merely be because of the currency fluctuations when doing comparisons.
Hi,
When there is no date of the work, we put n.d., but how about the same author published some works that do not have date, do we still add a,b,c…, e.g. n.d.a, n.d.b? I am wondering if it is correct because it looks strange.
Many thanks.
The fact is the reader needs to be able to match a comment made in the text to the source of the comment via the list. It may look strange but it does the job. Remember too as I point out in the article on Referencing, for the RAP perfection is not required but appreciation of the basic rules is expected. I would suggest leaving a gap between the n.d. and the suffix/appendage e.g. n.d. b – then it looks slightly less odd!
Thank you for your reply.
Yes I made a mistake… I have already known this fact that ratios eradicate the need of currency translation but during the preparation of RAP it did not click into my mind and neither my mentor pointed out to me this common error.
This is my third and final attempt of OBU plus I am not sure about whether I have reached the 10 year limit or not. I already emailed ACCA for this. I checked my ACCA account I was granted first exemption in June 2008 so I am assuming my 10 years will be completed in May 2018.
But for now I have to wait for ACCA confirmation regarding the last session of OBU meanwhile I have to work on my RAP to prepare it to the standard I can pass it.
I have three questions, kindly answer them at your earliest:
1- I was reading the GSK FS and in the FS GSK’s CFO provided financial analysis, if in that analysis the reasons for fluctuation of various FS line items were mentioned for example “due to exchange rate fluctuation” then how can I provide a different reason other than provided in the published FS?
2- Reasons for fluctuation in FS line items like trade receivables, inventories, cost of sales, trade payables, short term borrowing and long term borrowing are very difficult to get from external sources so for those should I refer to reasons provided in published FS? or should I try to make indirect connections like sales increased due to XYZ reasons (i.e. with external reference) therefore trade receivables also increased?
3- Is it prohibited to refer to published FS for reasons of fluctuation? If yes, then if I am unable to find reasons for fluctuation from external sources then what should I do?
Thank you again for answering my queries. You are of real help.
1. Ok if the COD cites this reason who am I to argue? So use his quotation to justify this
2. Yes external commentators rarely comment on aspects of the current ratio. It is difficult for me to comment with authority without a study of the company but yes an emphasis on the inter-connectedness of the ratios with revenue is more reliable than the year on year trends if the currency rates have been subject to volatitily (where currency rates are stable there is less of a problem)
3. I am not entirely sure what you mean. Currency fluctuation comments from analysts are more likely to be reliable and where a company operates globally there will always be an element of this. What I was (trying to say is that when you are analysing cash and liquidity items be aware that year on year comparisons and direct comparisons with another company may not be so reliable as you have taken their financial results (elements of which such as overseas sales may have already been translated) and you are restranslating them.
All is not lost ‘re your P35 submission – the markers tend to be slightly kinder with a 3rd and final submission -that does not mean they will pass it – however if you have complied with the previous feedback and made a reasonable attempt they will not be quite so critical so the chance of a pass is a bit better
Trephena… Thank you for your clarification… its of real help…
Can you please clarify on your first answer… What I understand from your answer is if in the analysis provided in FS by CFO, it is mentioned that fluctuation was mainly due to exchange rate fluctuation or XYZ reason, then I just need to cite that in my RAP with reference to annual report… Am I understand your point rightly?
To clarify my question no: 3… I just want to know whether I can refer to analysis provided in published FS in my RAP? specially when I won’t be able to find the reason for fluctuation from external sources?
Further… due to having different presentation currencies… I had to translate the share price… I translated share price from LSE in USD by using year end rates provided in published FS of the company… Did I do it right? and should I mention in my reasons that share price fluctuated partly due to exchange rate fluctuation and partly due to XYZ (i.e. external reference) reason? How can I minimize my risk of failure in this case?
I am trying to address maximum failure points raised by the moderator but from my past two experiences what I understand is OBU marker are quite strict and failed due to small errors… Therefore I am quite wary in this attempt and want to cover my risk of failure from maximum possible aspects…
I hope and pray that I can manage to pass this time!
I really appreciate your efforts trephena to help me minimizing my risk of failure this time…
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