APM*** P5 December 2011 Exam was: Post your comments and vote in Instant Poll ***

aahhhhhhhhh time constraint :(

So what was examined this time?

Q1 Expected value and risk & uncertainty
Q2 Performance Pyramid
Q5 a) Quality Cost
b) Kaizen Costing
c) JIT
Q3 and Q4 ask other student ......... :(

Q1, 35 marks, Q2 25, & 20 each for the rest.

I did the exam backwards, and found it ok. I did Q5 & Q4, but cant recall what Q4 was. I managed to answer all questions, but didnt complete them all(ie enough points). There was a big 19 marks in Q1 for calculations. I left it till last & didnt have time to think about it properly. I put down some numbers, but probably only scored a few marks. I guessed the Performance Pyramid was coming up, and learnt an anagram the day before, which was lucky.

Oh, and Q1 computational said perform the weights & measures(or something similar) in risk & uncertainty. It was an odd & unexpected phrase asked, and put me off a bit.

P2(mind musher) & P1 next

And a mighty big THANKS to opentuition.com for the video lectures, I definitely would have failed if I had only relied on the Kaplan course(key topic videos are pathetic).

i thought this diet was ok but seems that most vote goes to Disaster. So i chose to flow with the masses.

q4 is about the Albacore or Albastore or something. It talks about the head office having a traditional budget approach and uses actual vs budget (variance analysis) as a KPI for the store manager.

It was my second attempt.. and I found June11 much easier than Dec11.
Requirements were confusing. I also started backwards, it was ok, but less time was for Q1 as I already knew that I could not write much especially for b part.

again hope for 50 marks :)

GUYS GUESS WHAT! I think i had the best P paper yet..It was such a little cutie!! Literally minutes before the exam I was shaking due to the difficulty of level set by this NEw examiner..I think God Mighty heard my prayers this time..Had a paper that I can hopefully say I SHOULD pass BUT
19 mark q1 (b) I just wrote all the EV and dec rules and talked about it..tried the working but I know I messed up :( Still shouldnt fail me right :(

btw q4 was based on BUDGETING NOT KPIs... that was 3

what the hell question one was :( i knw rest ov ppr but that 19 marks its making me cry :(

that 19 marks in Q1 hurts!!!

Lack of time....( I' d like to write much more...

I recall now, Q4, was both some budgeting, some KPI & mostly performance measurement, in a discussive nature.

A company had a poor simple system of bonuses & appraisal, and we were asked to advise if it was fair(which it wasnt), so it was also a beyond budgeting question also for me, as I went down that line.

I liked that question, although I did repeat some points from Q5, which couldnt be helped. I forgot to do calculations as I didnt need them, but went back and squashed in comments that related to the figures.

I need to knom the answer of those who vote ok, regarding Q1 b

I think it killed me big time?

I started with Q.4 and Q5 next, then i went to question from hell. The 19mks allocated to Q.1 b was frightful, i started panicking, cld nt think straight, but at least wrote smthg on report-risk (cnt even remember if it was part of Q.2or Q1.). Not sure abt passing or failing. Section B overall was attainable, but Sect A was rubbish. I'm tired of ACCA now. Still hv P2+P3 next week. Oh God help me!

ppl any one who knows is there any percentile system in ACCA??...n if the paper is difficult do they assess it leniently??......it was more than a disaster!!!!

those who forfeited q1 19m think bout this

the question already provide u hint on how to assess it

saw the table like thing with probability?

u should think of Expected Value already

if u create a table for EV

u can also calculate Maximax, Maximin, Minimax Regret for it also

thought it was going ok till i got to questin 1. would be happy with 10/35 for it. i talked about risk averse, neutral and positive. talked about accepting, reducing,transferring and avoiding. total waffle.

@fahecy2

in fact I thought of TARA for Q1 ii)

but then I saw probability then i changed my mind

well I only talk bout risk averse and risk seeker attitude

(shit... I spelled it as adverse)

q! 19 marks... i did everything from ev to maxi min mini max rules... though im not sure about it, i dont remember what i did with Q2. Q4..must be okay..im not sure..q5b..Kaizan costing? i think i missed reading that in my studies...nobody else seems to have a problem with it..:( ...fingers crossed!

@redrose

Kaizen means Total Quality Management

still I don't know how a)b)c) can affect the standard costing system/ employee management and etc

@nileshrata said:
that 19 marks in Q1 hurts!!!

Agreed, though previously there have been fewer marks for such a large calculation, so from that point, it was fair to give more marks, and therefore, more time allocated to do it.
Anyway, dont think about the 19, think about the other 81, you only want 50 either way.

I am also from the ones that panicked with Q1 - left it last, started calculating something - I did some expected values, but did not manage to do the table, tried something for maximin, maximux, a total disater with this question. I did Q 4 and 5 and 2 but have in idea if it was OK or not. Was so upset with Q1.....I hope just to be able to get 50 marks - that is all I pray for!

tzxsean/redrose

how u create table on EV. did u calculate based on vc plus fixed cost, number of demand............just curious

disaster ......huhhhhhh

anyone attempting Q3.......

I have no clue what ACCA examiner expect from us?
Sorry to say, they are not expecting us to become accountants/analysts... All we have to do is to speed up..
Whats the point of wiriting exams, when we cannot even read/understand the scnerios... If i had 3 hour 3 minites to write this exam, i would have done wonders.. but thanks to ACCA.. they are preparing athletes, not accountants!

well I'm with you guys, was feeling really bad about question 1 b but reading your comments now I feel slightly better :))

I have Advanced Tax tomorrow and thought this would be the easier of the two, fingers crossed tomorrow is better.

Q1, i forgot to do it as a report as i did that question last and was running out of time, i've done that on other exams and still passed, 4 marks down the drain...woops!!! but i did expected value but run out of time to do maximin, minimax regret etc but mentioned you could do it..might get 1/2 mark for this..they all count I suppose. The calculations for EV got Type 2 for the best, probably wrong but i had a go..
Q2, ok i suppose, i knew the Performance Pyramid, but not sure what the examiner wanted for the first part re the three key performance indicators, I ended up mentioning beyond budgeting..had to get it in somewhere
Q3, the one about the school, well I had a go...some of it was very audit based, for the last part i wrote about Enterprise Resource Management System
Q5, Did the question first as I knew quite a bit about Kaizen and JIT, but still worried about my performance on question one.

At the end of the day i only want 50%, i heard a rumour that the last P3 exam June 11 was standardised up, so hoping for some luck, but at least the majority didn't like the paper, i would be more worried if you loved it.

Jimbo

@superb

1st column type 1-3
2nd column demand
3rd column total VC (VCxdemand)
4th column total FC
5th column profit margin (VC+FC x19%)
6th column EV (take profit margin from each demand x probability and add up)

@jimbo21 said:
Q1, i forgot to do it as a report as i did that question last and was running out of time,
.
.
i heard a rumour that the last P3 exam June 11 was standardised up

lol, that reminded me, I remembered to do it in a report format. However, the invigilator said we have 2 minutes left, & I knew I couldnt finish, but may as well try for those Prof marks, so figured I should stick in a conclusion anyway, even though I had only scraps of calculations done.

Conclusion: I hope the above helps you in your decision, and if you have any queries on the above, or would like to utilise my services on other projects in the future, please do not hesitate to contact me

Its funny, cause in real life, if I was the CEO, id be thinking "is this guy for real, he'll be lucky if he gets paid for this half-ass job" Hopefully my marker has a sense of humour !

Unrelated question...
Whats standardised up mean ? Is that if using a 50% pass rate, only 10% pass, so they increase the pass rate to say 55%?? Am I understanding this ? Do ACCA do this to save face ?

Absolutely painingful, didn't understand what the examiner wanted us to do, the style was totally different from June paper. Just feel the examer jumped up for something, what are the topic of this paper? The examiner just tested all areas he didn't test in June.

@smidsy

do u think ACCA will do that? P level papers for optional

the pass rates swings around 30% LOL