APM*** P5 December 2014 Exam was.. Instant Poll and comments ***

1a was Performance Prysm and how it links to the three strategies of Stakeholder management, Benchmarking, and JIT

How did you find Q4? There was limited information and the company was in the safe zone. Feedback please...

time pressured! but paper wasnt too bad just like all previous diets,,, only that pass rates keep on being pathetic since Dec 2010. This was my 4th attempt, 10papers i passed on 1st attempt, 2 on 2nd attempt and one on 3rd attempt. P5 is the only one left, if i dont make it i'll confidently say something's wrong with the examiner. 29% pass rate is so low and to have it in every sitting, different students is worrying, maybe acca should start looking at this examiner, its not possible for thousands of students to be wrong and only the examiner right.... just my opinion

This examiner needs to adopt the Fitzgerald and moon model when writing exams, clarity, achievable etc. he really like playing with words. Anyways, I got too excited with question 1, I was so excited that I spent till noon writing. It was a good question, but left the last question out JIT. not sure about EVA calc, I just taken operating profit, added back finance charges(net) , added back development costs, then capital, taken 2013 PPE figure, added development costs and applied the 11%WACC, I said I assumed that the debt was after tax. I talked about performance prism and also about benchmarking, said ratio were good but needed some other stuff, example there was no proper ratios for staff etc. other ratios suggested number of key customers and EBITFA Then I done Q2, this was about local council and NFPIs. I talked about the importance because of economic edfixienxy and effectiveness. I always completed some ratios for vfm, inducing number of complaints, staff costs, amount of waste etc compared to national. This was bit rushed. Then I done q4, and that confused me a bit, I basically said that the Z score and Q score (which Inhave no idea why would he add another model!) is not the best meaure as it relates to past performance , it's based on financial statements subject to manipulation. The company takes 2 years to see ore after mining and by the time you complete a z score . The company would have already gone bust. The. I said that the company should ensure that all lifecycle costs are captured , there is a proper board with technical expertise, contingent costs are included to prevent failure. Also, I had no idea how to measure quality in Q2, my bad, my brain was thinking NFPI, so I talked about balanced score card, TQM and league tables !! ?? Oh well, I don't wanna be pessimistic, but I'm gonna see this paper the 4th time. hopefully this examiner will win the lottery and bugger off. ! :)

PS Inknow in real life situation, the situations are complex and hence the examiner is trying to examine a close to real scenario, but also, with the same argument, In a real scenario I have google and books!!!

And you also have more time!

Yep, I don't think a ceo will ask you, here is my total mess of a business, shareholders are concerned with our decisions , figure out what the hell is going on in 45 minutes (1 question). I will be a millionaire!

If there was an obvious error in numbering, as long as the examiner can figure out which question you attempted, you'll be fine. The answer will still be marked if (s)he is able to match it. The correct numbering eases the marking process, but the marking is based on the content.

Could anyone remember all questions within q2 and marks for them?

Well my first sitting at P5 I think I was kinda excited at first, I thought oh I know these questions. Then after I started writing I felt that - damn time pressure!!!! So many ideas and couldn't put everything on pages. Q1 - drew a prism tried to relate facets to incentives. - I think this was tricky, coz they wouldn't link directly. Also when discussing stakeholders - applied mendelows matrix. But couldn't decide what to do with suppliers, I said minimal effort since there was a good competition among them. For benchmarking - calculated KPI's and compared to general machines. The trick was to get capital employed figure. Lol in previous exams capital employed was always given, so I stick at this. First I took total assets and calculated ROCE and EVA, but got negative numbers. Then after recalling what was capital employed I took Equity+long term liabilities. Bingo, I was right! Wrote some difficulties in implementing JIT system. Q2) I forgot to apply 3E's here :(((( my bad. Said that nfpo are hard to measure performance due to many stakeholders. Also sources of information. Per my calculation of KPI's BLA performed better than national average. It's goal at the moment was cutting costs so instead of laying off people it could decrease salaries, as they were higher than national. Also it was meeting target to recycle waste at 43%, whereas target is 40%. I even didn't read Q3, as it was so long. Lol Q4) gosh I kinda revised corporate failure but forgot many things. And at this point I was running out of time. I said that two models were different as one included x2 (forgot wat it was, guess pbit/total assets) and second had x6 (current liquidity ratio) I said both ratios were important on its own. Q model was closer to 3, which means company should revise its performance and make sure there were no risks of failure. Also wrote smth about decommissioning costs provision so that at the end it wouldn't make it insolvent. Mine life cycle = 23 years, right? Last point on suggestion measures to avoid failure, was so short in answers like increase revenue, increase fixed price contracts number to avoid risks on spot market (dunno if it is right measure), I feel relieved but think I will need to re-sit in June :(((

The issues of non financial measurements and how to solve ( 6 or 7 marks?) Why non financial measurements are useful (6 marks?) Suggested measures Did anyone do question three?

Question 1 was as expected - a report with measures and lots of discussion. I too think the second half of the paper was a bit daunting. To the person above who thought that info was missing on question 4 - my opinion is that the question was more evaluation and suitability, not commenting on results and workings of the model so I think your question was not missing information. I can honestly say this is the first exam I have come out of not knowing if I have done enough to pass or not, so all I can do is keep all fingers crossed for 50 marks! Anyway, my study notes are already packed away not to be touched again until Feb if necessary!! Best of luck everyone, and Merry Christmas Marky

In reference to Q4 corporate failure did the Q score quantitave model or qualitative, I am sure it mention Qualitative? please confirm

I stupidly chose question 3 (at first glance this looked better than Q4 I had exam brain clearly!) by the time I had read through the scenario and tried to work out part a to no avail I did contemplate switching to Q4 but with 25 mins left this was a no go!! Q1 & Q2 were ok I also got carried away on Q1 two and a half sides for 9 marks!! Exam brain again! Will be a hit or miss on passing due to Q3 I left part a outcompetely! I agree the examiner needs to just say what he wants instead of talking in riddles that wouldn't happen in the real world!

any body here for or her 5th attempt ??????????????????? I am the one and still not sure what will be the result ...... coz made a blunder by bubbled pages 5 instead of 2 ... and managed to solve around 90 marks

Completely agree miqtis!!!

It is quantitative model.

I too thought the question on Corporate failure was missing some info but then had to do with what was available. Z scores and Q scores are both quantitative models and since the scores calculated were both above the threshold for companies doing fine 3.5 n 3.1 I thought the best analysis would be to include a qualitative analysis model as well like Agenti's A score which talks about defects like having an autocratic CEO, an unbalanced board, a weak Finance Director, CEO and Chairman being one person etc........these defects will lead to mistakes like high gearing, overtrading failure of big projects etc and then symptoms of failure will be things like deteriorating financial indicators, creative accounting etc........straight from the book is the way I tackled it since there was not enough info. could be wrong but better than not writing anything.

Tough paper, primarily due to the usual time pressure. Q1 was fair but forgot to add the two additional P.I.s that were requested. Q2 was also fair, unusually "real world" type question which I think allows an examiner to judge if a student is capable. Then you look at the clock and realise that this is P5. The examiner is not a real world kinda guy and gives you question 3 and 4 to send you packing for Christmas in a really bad mood. Could not understand how one could justifiably contrast one "highly dubious" corporate failure model (Z Score)with one that has been made up for the exam (Q model)!!! The more I think of it the more I'm expecting the examiner to publish a solution that illustrates the examples with fictitious numbers that "good students should have come up with" to put a bit of context on the question. Scrambled for a few marks on part c to avoid corporate failure but nothing substantial. I pray that I got most, if not all of the heavy lifting in 1 and 2 otherwise it's back to books!!! #newexaminerpls

Scanning through this forum. Yet again I am seeing the same themes of too time pressured, unrealistic and cryptic question requirements....see my thread on pass rates & new examiner. Think we need to say something at least, just to get our voices heard

What did you guys get for 2 additional performance measures in q1? There was an info on number of potential customers, I realized it is of significance, however wasn't sure how to incorporate it into a sensible measure and just mentioned that company needs to monitor closely the number of potential customers and conversion rate on sales contracts. Development costs also seemed significant to me as company strives for high quality and innovation, but again, didn't know how to incorporate it into a sensible measure, just calculated dev. Costs to sales ratio, suggesting that Boltzman spends more on innovation and therefore future success. ??

Hope this exam looks different in its approach than the previous one demanding to compute number interpret and evaluate. ... which makes it time consuming plus the q3 a 10 marks with lots of info was unfair and q1 a 9 mark for prism is not fair as we should write all. Any ways, different approach and time consuming. Good luck!

if the pass rates continue to be dismal then ACCA should surely evaluate this examiner.... in fact if you ask me they should have done it last sitting when 71% of students failed.... Anyways all the best to you all

TOO TIME PRESSURED TRIED my best to write wanted examiner wanted to ask.

@ipatel IT was quantitative

Even i rushed the paper in order to complete it

This time it is fair from Alex. But the whole problem was time. P5 is such a paper where students need to think and organize their understandings as there is no unique answer. 15 minute reading time mainly used in memorizing different materials to be attempted but at the time of dealing with a particular question this is not easy to put all the things in a organized way. Time is very crucial and I guess everybody feel in the same way. Anyway hope for a sympathetic consideration from Alex's team for everyone who are suffering with this paper.

@Zohaib Relax and pray..to be on the safe side email acca ppl.

P5 is harder than other papers. We know that from looking at the pass rate. P5 had 29% pass rate, so 71% are going to fail. In the question about Z score there was no additional information. There was no need to calculate anything, because, as I understand, the question aske us to suggest what will make a difference in those figures.

@Ashish if that happens again many people will cheated by Acca... i will be one of the people to petition for the removal of this examiner should i not make it (4th attempt).... if students of different cultures, capabilities, style name it keep failing this paper year in year out, the only logical explanation is that there is something wrong with the examiner.. how could thousands of students be wrong yet one examiner right???? I passed all my other papers 90% of which on 1st attempt... are we saying all those examiners made a mistake to pass me??? are we saying previous P5 examiners were a sham??? Alex watt keeps saying all those stuck in P5 are not yet fit to be accountants, so is he saying the other P-level examiners are producing half baked accountants???? Results are not yet out and am already pissed!!!!! i dont wanna be stuck here forever