Re sitting a Level 3 AAT Indirect tax exam in a few weeks please share advice thank you!!

sarahwilliams

I have failed this exam twice now the first time I was 3% off and the second i was 15% off a pass. I revised for hours and hours daily and got to a point where the mock exams on AAT were easy and i felt really confident about the exam. Each time I have taken this exam it has been fairly different and a higher level than the mocks on the AAT website. I really want to get a distinction as I have never failed or scored this low on an exam before. Please can someone offer me advice and guidance for as much as you have time for. A single question or each section. I know the tax return form is the most important bit to have down as it is the most marks and i had got to a stage where I was very confident with it but in the actual exam there were corrections and imports and dispatches added in and i had no idea how to deal with this. If someone could mainly help me with understanding and being able to answer this question correctly too that would be much appreciated. Many thanks

nickyowl

Hi Sarah, are you doing self study? Did you use the additional information that is provided and this is a god send for and questions that seem simple but you may not be 100% sure of.

Did you remember to give answers to the correct decimal places on the tax return - this needs to be to 2 decimal places in boxes 1 - 5 and whole numbers in boxes 6-9. You'll lose marks if it's to the wrong decimal place.

There will always be at least 1 additional piece of information to add into the vat return figures, so practice dealing with corrections from the last return or amounts that have been missed and need to be added in, and ensure you understand how to deal with EU acquisitions too.

Are you confident in drawing up a VAT account? That really helped me understand where everything belongs.

Hope that helps a little, let me know if you have any specific questions and i'll try and help.

Nicky x

sarahwilliams

Thank you and I remember to the correct demical places and I usually remember what goes in each box. I go to college but my teacher isn't the best at explaining equations and things that you need to understand. It's just the corrections and Eu acquisitions I find the hardest x

nickyowl

I would ask your tutor for lots of past exam papers and practise those, and ask them to go through corrections/EU Acquisitions again.

AlisonSwanson

Make sure you thoroughly know how to draw up the VAT account and always draw one up as a working before answering tasks 6 and 7. From that you will be able to get your figures for boxes 1 to 5 of the VAT return correct. Everything on the Credit side of the VAT account, except VAT on EU acquisitions goes in Box 1, VAT on EU acquisitions goes in Box 2, everything on the Debit side goes in Box 4. Keep sales and sales returns on the credit side and keep purchases and purchase returns on the Debit side.

When you are making corrections, if the original mistake arose from a mistake with a sales invoice / credit note, enter the correction on the Credit side of the VAT return, if the mistake arose from a mistake with a purchase invoice / credit note correct it on the Debit side of the VAT account.

Task 8 seems to be heavily weighted with the new AQ16 exams so be careful with that one. Maybe complete tasks 6,7 and 8 first?

Finally, although you don't need to memorise the reference data, make sure you know the contents quite well. AQ16 tasks seem to require you to delve deeper into the information provided in the exam.

Good luck!

sarahwilliams

Thank you so much that really helps