MAC Question 1.1 wrong??

JoJoAlf

If it comes to light that Question 1.1 should have read sales instead of production what will happen? Will the question be disregarded when marking? Also, will an allowance be made for the fact that a lot of people spent too long trying to work out the answer to a potentially wrongly worded Q1.1 and were therefore faced with major time pressures for the rest of the exam thereby potentially getting much lower marks than they should have done due to rushing and pressure.
What a disaster! (I am still seething about the whole thing!)

SandyHood

Jojoalf
I am sure that Paul Bowen will read this and he may well respond on behalf of AAT.
As a lecturer my response is my own (only)
You asked the question:

Will the question be disregarded when marking? Also, will an allowance be made for the fact that a lot of people spent too long trying to work out the answer to a potentially wrongly worded Q1.1 and were therefore faced with major time pressures for the rest of the exam thereby potentially getting much lower marks than they should have done due to rushing and pressure.

My answer is I doubt it, and I hope you will follow my logic even if you think I am being mean and horrid.
The top of page two reads as follows:

This exam paper is in TWO sections.
You must show competence in BOTH sections. So, try to complete EVERY task in BOTH sections.
Section 1 contains 3 tasks and Section 2 contains 3 tasks.
You should spend about 75 minutes on Section 1 and 105 minutes on Section 2.
You should include all your workings and essential calculations in your answers.
Both Sections 1 and 2 are based on the business described below.
Section 1
You should spend about 75 minutes on this section

So you are told twice to spend 75 minutes on section 1.

As a lecturer I regard one of my over riding jobs as a coach preparing students for exams. That includes some highly time pressured exams where my students must look at key indicators and work against the clock to get as many marks as they can in the time allowed. This is quite different from striving for perfection. If you didn't know that before the exam, I would say that that was a weakness within your preparation and something that you may wish to address with your training provider.
For example I positively discourage my students from trying to make an operating statement balance - instead they are told to explain that they know it should and that they recognise their answer includes an error, and then get on to the next task.

If you ignored the 75 minutes for section one advice, I would say you only have yourself to blame.
Every single candidate will have had to deal with the question, the good ones will have made the best attempt they can and moved on to the next task.

AAT may take a different view, and I guess you will hope they won't ask me for my view when they do. Good luck Jojoalf, I hope you pass and I hope you recognise the importance of rationing that limited commodity in exams time so that it generates the best possible contribution to your success.
This is something that AACA and CIMA students do get used to before their exams, but it goes against the grain. At work perfection is so important, and taking a bit more time to achieve it is what we tend to do. But exams are a false environ ment and demand a different priority.

JoJoAlf

I can understand what you are saying but the reason I spend so long on the first question is that it took up a large proportion of Section 1 and we all know that we have to achieve the pass mark for both sections in order to pass. Normally I would have moved on more quickly but I felt that without Q1.1 I left myself very little chance of a pass.
Anyway, it is done now and I just have to sweat it out for the next 2 months!

Thanks for your comments Sandy.
JoJoAlf