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@faizy7 – I’m not sure I fully understand your problem -are you saying that you are not comparing the performance of your main company with a competitor at all?
If you are saying that you have looked at the 3 year trends for your main company(rather than taken a, year by year approach) I actually think that can be preferable as strategies and company policies (a) cover more than one year usually (b) there is often a time lag and (c) focusing on exact yearly figures rather than data trends often produces a report that is heavy on figures and light on sensible and reasoned evaluation. I understand from OBU that T8 should be a 3 year analysis for your main company but just the latest year for the competitor will be adequate for a pass in accordance with the Assessment Criteria (provided the E&A and everything else is satisfactory). So I hope that helps. 🙂
However if you are not drawing comparisons between the two companies at all – then yes that is likely to fail as it will not fulfil the Criteria as the E&A will not be sufficient.
It is always an individual decision whether to submit or not. Read my submission check list at the top of our Forums list to help but the final decision must be yours.
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no I have compare year by year of Target (3 years of Target)
but I also included Year by year analysis of competitor ( 3 year of Competitor)@faizy7 – not a problem if you have done 3 years for both (one year for the comparator is the minimum). A pass depends on the quality of your E &A – don’t just throw figures and percentages at the marker -that is not analysis -it is just number-crunching and anyone can do that with Excel/ calculator! They expect to see researched reasons that back up the trends and not just figures and obvious observations.
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Thank you again trephena, i think you were right. I called again the university for the second time for clear confirmation and I was told clearly taht they do not need my SLS. I told them the system won’t allow me to send without it and they advised me to write just a note to say I have passed the self relctiin and upload it in place of the SLS
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Hey
I submitted my RAP and SLS in Period 21 (2010-2011). i was able to pass the SLS but i failed in Research Report. The main reason for failure was because of1. Information gathering and referencing
2. Evaluation of information, analysis and conclusion.In both these areas i received a fail grade. My topic was financial analysis.
Now after a long period i would like to re submit a research report but change the organisation because previously i selected the wrong companies and i couldnt find a suitable competitor. There was also not much press coverage and i didnt have access to information so i was unable to get much information. The marker commented that most of the information was from annual report and this was one of the reasons for my failure.
Can someone please help me answering the following questions1. Can i change the organisations and if i do should i also make a new SLS ?
2. Should i get in touch with mentor again because i dont want to contact her again as she didnot really help me much in the first time ?- Topics: 0
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I really have lost touch with applying business models i studied in p1 and p3 although i got good marks above 80 % in each paper. I no longer remember them much and i would need to re learn them. Where i work i do carry out analysis but that is very detailed. I dont know how deep i need to go into the analysis because of this i need to know the level of analysis which needs to be done.
@usman009 – as you are talking about nearly 5 years ago you will find the requirements for the RAP have changed considerably since then. You really need to famaliarise yourself with the latest Information Pack before you begin. I suggest you also look at our homepage http://www.opentuition/boy where we have articles and FAQs that in particular deal with evaluation and analysis.
The areas you failed are the most common but the standard is even higher now to meet the assessment criteria than it was back in P21 so you need to use our search facility for questions you may have and read the answers. Please post any queries to the relevant forum topic (it is not necessary to open a new topic each time).
You will need a mentor to verify the work is your own
Please find my results below:
1. Understanding of accountancy/business models Pass
2. Application of accountancy/business models Pass
3. Evaluation of information, analysis and conclusions Fail
4. Presentation of project findings Fail
5. Communication Pass
6. Information gathering and Referencing Fail
7. Information Technology Pass
8. Self Reflection Pass
9. Communication Skills (inc Presentation) PassI have few queries regarding the resubmission:
1. Do I have to resubmit and update my SLS and SLS Presentation in line with updated RR?
2. Do I need any mentor to submit his detail during resubmission ? If not, then do i really have to care about my previous mentor whether he is ACCA approved mentor or not?I would appreciate any help.
Thanks in advance 🙂
You will not have to load your SLS / Presentation at all. However one of the main purposes of the mentor is to certify that the work you are submitting is your own and this applies to all work submitted for the BSc.
For P30 ONLY you may use a mentor who fits the qualification requirements under the ‘Old Rules’ i.e. they do not have to have done the online mentoring course but they either have to be a fully paid up ACCA member, college tutor or workplace supervisor (in the last two cases you need to email the OBU office and forward the mentor’s CV to get OBU agreement that the mentor is suitable unless they are already on the listed mentor list).
From P31 ALL mentors must be on the listed mentor list
(As you have failed on Evaluation & Analysis I suggest that you read my article on our homepage http://www.opentuition.com/obu as this may be useful for your resubmission and also my article on the Resubmission statement)
Thank you for the reply.
It means I have to submit a mentor details like the way I did it for P29, doesn’t it? For P30, I can use my previous mentor since he was an acca member.
Anyway, I have read that article. It was very helpful. Thank you so much for that.
I need another advice. The company I have prepared research on has published its report on april 2014. As to info pack, I can use 2014 data, but it is not a must. However, the comparator company has not published its report yet. It would hamper the comparability of my data if I consider 2014 for one company. What should I do?@sfarhan06 – yes the position re mentor details will be the same as for P29.
You will have to use the 2014 data as it was available more than 90 days before the submission period opened (in fact you should have used it for P29 surely or do you mean it was published on April 2015 not April 2014?)
My bad. It would be april 2015 when the AGM held and Annual report for 2014 was published.
@sfarhan06 – Yep thought that’s what you probably meant!
This is a bit awkward as the comparator FS aren’t available and as the main company 2013 accounts have now been superseded but are now a bit dated. This is the approach I would do bearing in mind you are not compelled to use 2014
1. Use the 2013 for both companies and base your comparisons on those
2. Make a statement in the Limitations section and state the actual date 2014 FS were published for main company
3. Introduce a section at the end called ‘Update’ and again mention that the accounts were only made available in April 2015 and 2014 was not available for the comparator.
4. In this updated section I would cover Revenue, GP, NP and EPS for the main company and make relevant comments and try to do a few good explanations
5. You could (if appropriate/feasible) use the 2014 FS for the SWOT and PESTLE
6. Base your Conclusion on both the main analysis and the updateNote: if you are struggling with the word count then trim Parts 1 & 2 of superfluous material – the marker on a resubmission will be focusing on Part 3 if you failed E & A and will be wanting to see that you are looking at what has driven performance rather than just mentioning that one company has out performed the other (let the graphs show that)
Thank you so much for the advice, very helpful indeed.
Among very few things that the OBU marker has remarked on my RAP feedback, Ratio analysis not being properly analysed is the significant one.
One of the reasons why I can’t discuss ratio earlier is word count. For whole financial analysis, I had allocated 2500 words. Among them, 1500 words were to discuss the important elements in Financial statemens. But I realised I might have discussed much on this part rather ratios.
My questions are:can I trim or delete this FS analysis part ( Revenue, operating income, balance sheet and cash flow analysis) , and increase ratio analysis?
There is nothing exciting happened in Balance sheet, and marker stated that this part was not discussed/helpful
as to my research objectives. Can I delete this part, and discuss on Gearing ratios instead? Those tare same and related I reckon.@sfarhan06 – The very last part you should trim is the Findings section as that is the ‘clever part’ that shows you can think for yourself and is what is key to getting a pass. Parts 1 & 2 are the areas you need to edit first (is anyone really bothered why you chose company XYZ? – I doubt it!). There is one thing you need to do if you have failed section 3 Evaluation, Analysis and Conclusions and that is Explanations, explanations and explanations! Ratio Analysis is merely a tool to assist with evaluation and too many figures without demonstrating what really has driven those figures will lead to another fail.
As I advise time and time again SHOW the ratio results in a graph and then you do NOT need to state lots of figures – readers/markers are fully capable of seeing the position for themselves and what they want is for you to tell them the factors (from the SWOT & PEST for example or the management strategies) that have caused movements in the trends.
I suggest that you read my article on Evaluation on our homepage http://www.opentuition.com/obu where I try to explain how to adopt the correct approach
@trephena
hello
i am resubmitting my project in May and the marker wanted me to put depth into my analysis. i have had previously used ROCE along with asset turnover and operating margin, gross margin, net margin, return on equity, return on assets and earnings per share for profitability analysis.
as i’m adding detail now i think i would have to exclude a few ratios. i’m thinking of omitting return on equity and return on assets. what do you suggest?@zeest – certainly you need to give the marker some in depth explanations – that is much better than lots of ratios. If the organisation is a service entity then the quick ratio is next to useless and unless the asset ratio / turnover shows anything significant those two would be the first I would chop out. The investor ratios are usually very important for the market so I would include gearing and probably keep ROE. You could take out some and (those that you are not going to explain as there is no real information just as graphs in the appendices.
However you do need to explain profitability ratios and dividend policies and EPS in as much detail as possible. From comments in the student feedback what the markers absolutely hate are (a) comments that just say that one company has outperformed the other (without explaining why this should be so) (b) statements of the obvious (something the markers can see for themselves from the graphs) and (c) ‘explanations’ that read like notes to the accounts -so avoid making these types of mistakes and research well so that you can explain things properly.
hello
i am resubmitting my project in May and the marker wanted me to put depth into my analysis. i have had previously used ROCE along with asset turnover and operating margin, gross margin, net margin, return on equity, return on assets and earnings per share for profitability analysis.
as i’m adding detail now i think i would have to exclude a few ratios. i’m thinking of omitting return on equity and return on assets. what do you suggest?@trephena
please ignore the previous message it was re-posted by mistake….
and thank you for the above reply …..
although i do want to mention here that my chosen company is a manufacturing company.
what would you suggest relating this to the previous query i.e. which profitability ratios will be relevant?@zeest – you really need to examine how well they are controlling direct costs and that their GP is pretty steady or increasing. Maybe you can look at the costs of inputs and see how they have fared over the 3 years.
I can only generalise but whatever the company you have to try to look for ‘connections’ in the figures in the FS – rather than just calculate a ratio you need to think about how it all meshes together when doing your analysis: e.g.Inventory turnover in manufacturing is probably worth looking at if the product is prone to deterioration or obsolescence and/or if the cash balances and liquid funds are decreasing as in this latter case the company may have to borrow to pay its way – which then impacts on finance costs and puts pressure on the net profit.
Hi @trephena
I am resubmitting in May and in my results it says:
Skills & learning statement
Graduate skills
8. self reflection – pass
9. communication skills(inc. presentation) – pass
skills & learning statement – passSo, my question now is am I required to submit SLS/presentation this time?
I understand that re- submission statement is a must this time.
Thank you
@hussainsabt92 -not if you are submitting on the same company and topic. However many students find that because of a glitch in the system they still have to load the Presentation i.e. sometimes you cannot complete the submission process without loading this file. However as I have suggested to students before, they should make a comment in the Resubmission statement to remind the marker that the Presentation has been passed (markers will probably already know this anyway)
The Resubmission statement should have been started as soon as you had received notification of the fail for the best chance of a successful resubmission – see my article on the Resubmission Statement on our homepage http://www.opentuition.com/obu
Thnx for your quick reply @trephena. I am submitting on a different company this time, so SLS/ presentation is required?
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