*** P3 June 2015 Exam was.. Instant Poll and comments ***

Any positive opinions out there? Seems everyone is expecting to fail!

Given we got PESTEL, 5 forces, outsourcing, project management and financial analysis I’d say they were core subject areas. They didn’t examine a lot of the smaller parts of the syllabus.

I consider it rather unfair that one would expect the paper to be completed in 3hrs. To cypher Q1 alone, takes roughly 2hrs at best, that is excluding part b. Not even with the greatest time-management skills unless u had some super power. By the time u were finished with question 1, all u wanted was a cool drink of water & a cool shade. No joke.

the scenario is too long wasted alot of time reading it. probably 1.5hr lost due to reading and making points . Just see how the result come out.

An old Bob Dylan song goes like “If you got a lot of forks and knives, you gotta cut something”. Translated in the context of ACCA exams this means if there are now 4 resits available during the year, students should participate in order to spread fixed costs. As I’ve been informed the P2 exam has also shifted in the same direction. The whole purpose is to “force” students fail and thus have more exams for the same subject during the year. Actually it’s disgraceful watching ACCA using such cheap marketing techniques (market penetration is it called?).

I wrote Q1,3 and 4 ,as usual time was a problem-i spent 1 hr 45 minutes on q1 and this costed me time for final question which had to do it in 30 minutes which is not enough to read the case story and understand it well and at the same time write an answer. But am hopeful i will make it.

I’m still readin this Q1 b some 2 days now and I can’t still figure out wat the examiner is asking.
I even doubt whether he didn’t even confuse himself.
this is a rip off honestly.
seriously acca, where is all the “ethical behavior”.
practice what you preach.
we are better off having 2 sittings with standard questions than 4 sittings with disaster questions.
even Q2 requirements aren’t straightforward especially 2a.
they want students to all opt for a particular perspective then they acca lean on the other perspective and claim that students didn’t answer what they asked for.
#add5marksforallP3 lool

@krislord said:
Any positive opinions out there? Seems everyone is expecting to fail!

Given we got PESTEL, 5 forces, outsourcing, project management and financial analysis I’d say they were core subject areas. They didn’t examine a lot of the smaller parts of the syllabus.

I didn’t do so well on the paper because i did not follow my own advice of practice writing as much past paper as possible. while i did go through all the pass papers and rev kit i did not write and that’s very important in this type of exam.

Overall while Q1 was long and there was a lot to go through it was expected. the general advice for doing P3 is time management and one part of that is instead of using 1.8 min per mark you use 1.5 and you write the time and when you start and when you finish.

the exam on a whole covered all the major areas. it could have been guessed that learning organisation and knowledge management would come on the paper as it was one of the last tech articles written.
there is always a project management question on the exam.

I honestly don’t think that the exam was very very hard for a well prepared student.

did i do well on it? nope i found question one long and with was hard to balance out the points for the PESTEL analysis i did but i tried to stick to the time and write what points i could find easily.
that 20 marker i had half hour to find five marks under each heading, did have anytime to do any expected value calculation but i jot down as much points as i could find and move on before the time was up.

did i pass? i dont know since i’m not sure if covered the main pain points.
August 1 will know.

still thinking i will have to do P3 and P5 for dec as i did not do enough prep work.

@latoyah84 said:
did anyone read this article before sitting the exam?

https://www.accaglobal.com/us/en/student/exam-support-resources/professional-exams-study-resources/p3/technical-articles/exam-marker.html

this doesn’t still justify 1b, I challenge u to read the whole text book, practice both kits Kaplan bpp, practice all handwriting and everything and come back to 1b, ull still have no clue.
it still doesn’t answer vague questions. The exam is not that extremely tough, I was super prepared. But its irrelevant about your preparedness if 1b comes up and vague questions come.

There’s a lot mentioning expected values for 1b, but I thought that only applied to repetitive activities? This was for a one off event.

@jigsaw1992 said:
this doesn’t still justify 1b, I challenge u to read the whole text book, practice both kits Kaplan bpp, practice all handwriting and everything and come back to 1b, ull still have no clue.
it still doesn’t answer vague questions. The exam is not that extremely tough, I was super prepared. But its irrelevant about your preparedness if 1b comes up and vague questions come.

quite honestly i cant tell you what 1b was about what i do know is that i looked for key words – is this the one with competitor analysis?

When i read the requirements i saw that – the first say environment – i thought PESTEL and 5 forces – then i saw something about Competitor analysis – i thought oh the examiner if guiding us here – so PEST first – then 5 forces – then OT from the SWOT.
the fact that the paper had so much information that all can be used in any way it was more about how to organize in my head where to put what and not be repeating myself for the various points and that took up a lot of time.

I was not looking for the perfect answer – it is a time pressured paper and from previous sitters i know that they are looking for time management skills. yes i could sit and wonder what the examiner wants from this or i look at his requirements and see ‘analyse environment’ and put as much points as i can from that based on the mark allocation. I have MikeLittle voice in my head telling me i need at least fifty marks from each section to pass as well as ive watched his method – there is no need to write two pages for 5 marks when it can be done in one paragraph – answer the what? why? and how? and you are good.

bear in mind that my answer and your answer can be saying something totally different and we will get the same mark based on the arguments we make.

@musa jobe – if i were you and practiced both Kaplan and Bpp kit and came out still not sure what the examiner was asking i would be upset as well.

I can only be upset with myself as my plan to practice all the past papers from 2011 to 2014 didn’t happen due to work pressure and sick baby in the last two weeks before exams.

So before the exam i took me two ibuprofen to stop a headache and in the exam i was one of them flashing my hands because it got cramps.

@raviyat said:
Hi guys, I am wondering if anyone like forum moderator or other knowledgeable person could shed some light on 1c 20 marker question it seems we all struggled with. What is the right answer, I was reading it again, but still confused. I did write up some ideas but not sure it is right though. I feel that this particular subquestion will make a difference between pass and fail.
In my analysis I used pay back period choosing the one that pays faster, the option that pays back faster is tendering without acquisition. However due to the potential changes to the tendering process (only existing companies will have a real chance to get the license) 2 tel should elect tendering through acquisition. Then mentioned couple of advantages of acquiring 2me like existing infrastructure, staff etc. the other two options were just a trick I personally think how you are going to enter the market without applying for license. I didn’t do any calculations with probabilities, just don’t know where to use them apart from saying the chances of going solo to tender will result in very little chance to win the license. Such a shame I have been preparing for 3 months solid for this exam.

Hi Raviyat. I’m assuming from what you say that the question paper is available online. Do you have a link please? Thanks.

The link to June 2015 paper is here:

https://www.accaglobal.com/an/en/student/exam-support-resources/professional-exams-study-resources/p3/past-exam-papers.html

It’s right at the bottom of the page under ‘Related Documents’

Employers made complains to ACCA that qualified accountants understand strategy but decision making is poor and they added management accountancy in p3; therefore guys it’s highly likely management accounting will be tested more than ever in p3 in future