TXJune ’10 Exams POLL – Paper F6 was … Post your comments here

It was a very very vey challenging paper.
Question Partnership was very dificult.
Puff hoping to get 50%

@akberacca said:
Oh poor you ..
i hope you pass man

i have to give F8 this time i hope the paper is not a surprise like F6

Same here, got another paper this Thurday....... hope it will be not a real hell like today's paper...This is very sad..sincerely..kinda depressing

:(

very challenging paper though i practised most of the exam kit questions.
examiner has changed his style..am perplexed whether the examiner said he would change his style.

@schoo said:
very challenging paper though i practised most of the exam kit questions.
examiner has changed his style..am perplexed whether the examiner said he would change his style.

This paper was very unsual indeed.....all the revision in vain...

i had no issues with changed style.. but marks allocation was a main issue..

@mrxamag said:
i had no issues with changed style.. but marks allocation was a main issue..

The mark allocation..well i sad for 1 min and said hell all that for 3 points....

for certain question the 3 points were definitely not enough,,,,,

This paper was fine, I had no problems with it :)

Very heavy on the administrative side of tax, but honestly I'm feeling good about it - if you know your VAT and self assessment deadlines and penalties this paper is a gift

One down, three to go!

even q5 was a bit lengthy for me atleast

I agree that the format was VERY different but the Capital Allowances for question 1 was all in the tax tables - 100% FYA etc. I think it was a matter of shock at the way it was written. My main concern was the amount of theory with regards to tax penalties and dates. I think the examiner has got the World cup on his mind with all those penalties!!!

wer all the the quartrly paymnts in q5 equal, or jst1=2 and 3=4?

Can someone please recall where they saw all the VAT marks?

I can only recall seeing it in Question 1. The examiner also had previously mentioned that he would not straddle the VAT standard rate change so I'm wondering why we had to accrue VAT evenly throughout the period.

As far as my thoughts.... the exam was indeed unusual. The information seemed to be presented in a very disruptive manner making for a hard read. Mark allocations seemed to only increase the weighting applied to taboo subjects. It was as if the examiner had said he would reverse all stereotypes of the paper in one go (i.e. less computation, more theory).

I am hoping and praying for a marginal 50% pass. I didn't find time pressure but I did find that it was longer than I had expected.

And the funniest part of the exam... Quagmire. Did anyone else think family guy!?

I found Q1 very confusing!
The part which asked to calculate the amount of VAT paid during the year. I spent a while trying to average out spending and sales, to then work out different rates of VAT, and then thinking 3 marks is not a lot for all the calculations, and how is it possible to tell if there was any VAT exempt purchases? So I crossed out all my workings and used the VAT amounts that were given in the beginning of question 1. I don't think the questions were worded right and found it hard to decide what he was asking for. Was hoping for a decent mark in this paper, but think I'll be lucky to scrape 50! I wasted too much time and didn't get the paper finished.

Did I miss something in this question? The partnership was VAT registered right? As they were looking to go onto the flat rate scheme. So the VAT on sales was excluded in the taxable trading profit adjustment as you don't pay tax on a tax.
So therefore you only used the figure for VAT on sales given (£21,600) and not work out the whole years sales VAT which would cross over the two different VAT rates?

Oh dear I was so happy after the paper but coming here has made me somewhat confused. Maybe I just "think" my paper went good and it didnt actually. :S

Yes the format was very different. An adjustment of VAT in trading profits was never seen before but fortunately last 2 days I practiced less and concentrated more on self assessment and VAT and was able to recall most of the stuff. What was so tough about VAT though apart from the trading profit adjustment? 15 marks on partnership was a bit of a shocker but I think I got it right in the end. Trading profit was 80000.

Question 3's first adjustment was brutal but fortunately I had done the 1985 share pool and I think I applied things correctly. The BPP book FA2009 specifically said that the examiner wont make a detailed question on FA1985 pool so I guess that's unfair. Overall I didnt find the Q very tough although I maybe wrong about having done it correctly myself.

Q5 was dead easy and I managed to save alot of precious time as well as I was getting nervous about missing a good chunk of the paper.

Q4 was kinda strange indeed. However I knew most of the stuff but didnt know the time limit for discovery assessments and the details regarding fraud and all that. I did remember the penalties but still this question is far too strange to really say much but I am postive about it.

Q2 was the toughest and I had realised it in the reading time and had decided to do it in the end. I think I got property income mostly right apart from a guess on business rates as being allowable. But the losses question was the real disaster where I ended up applying income tax losses rules. The director part was also a wild guess from me and I wasnt able to finish it so i guess you can say about 10 marks gone in the bin.

I can certainly see the potential of well prepared students not getting it right and there's nothing worse than preparing so hard and then getting it wrong. However dont forget there are marks for individual things and if you have done atleast 90% of the paper then you can get alot of things wrong and still pass.

@accaman said:
This paper was fine, I had no problems with it :)

Very heavy on the administrative side of tax, but honestly I'm feeling good about it - if you know your VAT and self assessment deadlines and penalties this paper is a gift

One down, three to go!

Im with you accaman. This was my first ACCA exam and I was expecting a lot worse. I didnt practice any past exams which sounds like that was to my advantage! I think I will have got the 50% needed to pass. I probably revised too much as I was quite worried about the exam.

Hope you all pass!

x

@d019452 said:
I found Q1 very confusing!
The part which asked to calculate the amount of VAT paid during the year. I spent a while trying to average out spending and sales, to then work out different rates of VAT, and then thinking 3 marks is not a lot for all the calculations, and how is it possible to tell if there was any VAT exempt purchases? So I crossed out all my workings and used the VAT amounts that were given in the beginning of question 1. I don't think the questions were worded right and found it hard to decide what he was asking for. Was hoping for a decent mark in this paper, but think I'll be lucky to scrape 50! I wasted too much time and didn't get the paper finished.

It was actually 2 marks and it even asked to ignore the charges on fuel. I very briefly thought about doing what you did but 2 marks and the ignore the fuel part convinced me that it required a very simple calculation. And there wasnt even information on zero-rated and standard rated etc. The wording was horrible though, seems unprofessional to me but oh well.

donno what was wrong with the examiner....very very tough especially for the ones who were sitting ACCA exams for the first time and a lot of questions were not from study guide (BPP)...Hope to get 50...

Business rates...I have assumed that is something like other rates i.e water and deducted it. And what about sub lease but without paying for a head lease? This really freaked me out?!?!? Bad wording again?

@zicca007 said:
Business rates...I have assumed that is something like other rates i.e water and deducted it. And what about sub lease but without paying for a head lease? This really freaked me out?!?!? Bad wording again?

No it's not, there was simply no premium on head lease so no working needed for head lease. The computation was the same as you di with head lease.

@akberacca said:
Oh poor you ..
i hope you pass man

i have to give F8 this time i hope the paper is not a surprise like F6

Now this is scaring me... as i also have to attempt on wed and thursday...!!!
wish i atleast get that magic 50.....

@sana said:
Now this is scaring me... as i also have to attempt on wed and thursday...!!!
wish i atleast get that magic 50.....

Same here...cross finger for f9

now focusing on the next paper....the Examiner did a bang up job on todays..what a shocker. the pass rate for UK tax will finally be as low as the other international papers. I think that was the reason for such a difficult exam this time around

agreed with "gambler747"

evnthough paper was tricky, bt there was potential fr lots of marks fr well prepard studnts!

I felt quite confident in my knowledge before the exam... But it was too much... honestly...

Worst paper in the history of f6

So much for being told what to expect in certain questions, paying a lot of money for BPP courses and then not even getting a personal income tax comp... I'm not happy at all.

Think I did pretty well in the last two questions, but there was way too much VAT.

I hope for 50 :S

This was a tough paper no " givemes" all i can do is laugh now and move on to the next one.

The only thing i can raise issue with is the thing about "business rates" what did that mean? ... I included it as an expense was that correct?

fingers crossed for a 50
it was very difficult

I just hope for 50 marks at this point. Most I can say is I tried my best.