Level 3 Synoptic Exam

Multiplicator

salma - crikey !
Linmoy - I am sorry you were off by 2% - a bit of re arranging might have done it
( and you only have to do a Little bit better in order to pass )

I was 8 off - and that is about half-a question - the divide is 60-40 between parts 1 and 2
as Charlie Brown might have said - the difficulty is doing the first half of the question before worrying about the extra half ....

anyway well done to those who successfully ran the gauntlet - wear your laurels with pride !

JW94

Sat my Level 3 Synoptic Exam this morning-absolute nightmare.
1st half was fine, finished with 20 minutes left after I'd tripled checked all my answers. One of the girls in my class had problems with the exam freezing often but the time still ticking down (my teacher recorded how long it was frozen for to report to the AAT)
But then came spreadsheets. Wording of the questions was absolutely awful, not clear on what they are wanting to do which means you waste time reading things over and over again. I have used every single mock exam I can get my hands on and none of them were as difficult and complicated as the exam I sat this morning. Ended up running out of time. I don't know how anyone can read the questions, figure out what they're asking, attempt the questions (have to get it right first time round as there isn't enough time to try and figure out the answer!!!) and check their answers within 1 hour and a half!
Very unimpressed with this and completely disheartened as I've worked very hard for this exam.

AATBIKER

It sounds like nothing has changed from the last round of exams. I'm having to resit in a couple of weeks, it was the excel part I failed on, not because of lacking excel skills but I couldn't work out the question. I'm dreading the resit if I fail again I'm chucking it in!

annvboys

this is just ludicrous. remind me, why do we need to show we can colour a cell green using custom formats? how is this bookkeeping/accountancy?
dreading my resit.
Make sure you complain to AAT

Multiplicator

I have also commented on the level 4 thread
as it was combined level 3 and 4

as I am naturally mischievous - read what Steve H has to say there !

annuboys - I couldnt do my cell pink ! FAIL that man!

annvboys

you clearly have no accounting skill whatsoever!!

dahlia

I'm with you @annvboys on "custom formatting"!

Kc1

@JW94 I agree. Questions today where crazy. I did not have a clue what they was asking to do. Also no mock or extra work the college gave me was in as much detail as this exam.

JW94

@Kc1 is that you, Kerry? If so, it's Jorja! I still cannot believe how complicated the questions were, Angela did say she was going to email the AAT about the wording. It's so frustrating as I know all the content but spent so long trying to figure out what the hell I was supposed to be doing!!!

Kc1

Yep it's me. Yes she told me the same. I ended up cry in the last 3 mins coz I knew I had not done enough. First half of the exam I found fine. Finished it in an hour but I waited for my time to run out. The last task well lol I got lost after reading the first line lol.

Kc1

@JW94 feel like I wasted 3 hours of my time today, could of done with that 3 hours at work. My mums is qualified and she said they work stuff really hard to how they use to.

AATBIKER

Please write and complain about the wording, many of us who sat it last time did unfortunately it hasn't seemed to make much difference yet but we need to keep the pressure on them. I got a stock reply saying they were trying to fix the IT issue before they look at the questions- oh great. But hopefully they will do so now.

sealab

I had my senoptic on 10 of July and it was an exam from the hell, the first part was fine but when I got to the second part which is excel the computer wouldn't allowed me to start first it was keep freezing, I was trying very hard to do this assessments but the computer was freezing every 20 min, despite it is very complicated exam as this is the combination of 2 they made it very wording, I am not a native English speaker and English is not my first language so I need to understand a question to be able to answer but it was so difficult to find out what they want, in my class there are 8 of us who English is not their first language, I was hoping to get professional degree in Uk as was not able to continue my studies back home and doing this course was giving me hope to achieve something in my life but being in this class made me realised I can't maybe continue this course , I am dyslectic and I do get an 30 min extra time for my exam , but it seems I might not be able to pass this exam . I finished only one assessment and spend 5 hours there for the exam as my computer was freezing every 20 min so I ended up of not finishing my exam and I burst in tears , I put so much time and effort for this exam , but now it seems that I have to re sit it I know it was not my fault , but This problem is going on from October and people keep complaining , it seems AAT doesn't care at all , why they should care as they are not doing this exam . We started with the class of 12 but level 3 was so complicated for most of us that we ended up to finish the course by only 4 the rest they just give up . Looking to Synoptics 3 other of us thinking of getting a job and not do level 4 . This is only level 3 for God sake it's not Acca F7 and F8 that they make it so hard , if level 3 is so difficult how the levels above would be completely disappointed with my decision to do this course , I paired £2000 to buy stress and disappointment for my self ....

JW94

The questions were worded very badly, English is my first language and I had quite a bit of trouble understanding it!
It's very frustrating that there kind of problems are still happening, we were told by the time we took our exam these problems would have been ironed out-clearly not!

I got emotional as well Kerry, it was very stressful.

AATBIKER-do you know the best address/email to write to regarding this? I'm not usually one to complain however I feel I've worked very hard for this and don't want it to go un-noticed that the exam is terrible!

sealab

In level 3 we never write an email and explained or report anything , so we had no experience of that , despite writing an email I had to explain what is professional seciptisim which I have no idea what it is , and I couldn't find it in any of my book, I don't how they came across some of the staff which we haven't done it and they expect us to answer it I am sure most of professional accountant don't know what is that, whatever AAT is trying to do with students I think it's not fair , it puts off a lot of people from this course , I am not a professional accountant to be able to report and explain these things that they ask for , I am a student I need to learn and this is their job to teach us things we need to know , but it seems Aat thinks we should be genius to do this course , which I am not

sealab

i know my teacher told me there won't be any charge when you do it next time , as computer was freezing , but that can't buy my 3 months effort that I put towards this course to pass my exam

Mike Webster

sealab said:

In level 3 we never write an email and explained or report anything , so we had no experience of that , despite writing an email I had to explain what is professional seciptisim which I have no idea what it is , and I couldn't find it in any of my book

Professional scepticism is mentioned twice in the qualification standards document for the Advanced Diploma in Accounting:

Under bullet point 5 of Learning outcome 2.3 Objectivity (Ethics for Accountants) is clearly states: "the importance of professional scepticism when exercising professional judgement"

and in Learning Outcome 3.4 of Final Accounts Preparation (Assess the reasonableness of given figures within a particular context) you have to be able to: "exercise professional scepticism."

You should always have the qualification specifications to hand to ensure that you can say yes to every learning outcome/assessment criteria. If you can't, ask your tutors.

AATBIKER

Myself and others in my class wrote to - customersupport@aat.org.uk
You eventually get a reply but it takes an age. It's only by complaining the things will be changed

I'm one of a few in my class who have decided not to progress to level 4 because of this which is a shame I was doing really well, I don't work in finance but still achieved 80% in all my other exams so this is really disappointing.

JW94

I will be emailing today to complain.

That is such a shame, there will be no accountants left at this rate!

sealab

Thanks for mentioning the professional seciptisim , but I don't think mentioning the title would help the student to be that genius to get to understand what is professional seciptisim, please let me know if any student knew that part of book can explain professional seciptisim, or its only me ???

AbbyCarr

I'd like to point out there wasn't any uplift in the Level 4 Synoptic exam, especially not one of 10%. They must be referring to MDCL exam.

AH96

I was so surprised by the exam yesterday morning - a very confusing paper that took ages to understand. I had to change my 2.3 about 4 times as i kept re-reading it and interpreting it a different way. And obviously when you change one thing on a spreadsheet it affects everything else so i have no idea what i ended up submitting! There was no time to check anything, tasks that have never come up in our revision, and was so far from what I was expecting it might as well have been a different syllabus! I cannot believe they think an hour and a half is an acceptable time to complete this in!

eridanus

sealab said:

Thanks for mentioning the professional seciptisim , but I don't think mentioning the title would help the student to be that genius to get to understand what is professional seciptisim, please let me know if any student knew that part of book can explain professional seciptisim, or its only me ???

Professional scepticisam is the practice of being sceptical towards figures or data given to you, so basically to not always blindly trust figures you are given, and if you have suspicions of anything that seems off or malicious to you. To question those figures/data you were given.

Multiplicator

well you all seem to have had a good time in the late July sittings !

our masters ( AAT) say that the computer freezing problem has been solved apparently for this week
so if you had problems get on the email system and complain

I cant say I had much difficulty with professional scepticism - wasnt it - write an email being sceptical about such and such figures - so I did.

Have I recommended the excelisfun site on You-tube ? Business highline course - you come out with a decent working knowledge of Excel -

Good luck everyone in the retakes - they are being organised as chaotically as everything else - so no change there then.

Multiplicator

// I'm one of a few in my class who have decided not to progress to level 4 ?/

did you pass ? dont you have to pass Level 3 before doing level 4 ?
From the Level four discussions there is a car crash exam at the end of the course there as well
( note - the first exam is NOT a car crash in level 4 - which raised my suspicions ( professional scepticism perhaps) about AAT's integrity )

and as for AAT being unable to run an exam or retakes properly - doesnt that engage professional competence ?
( you see I did concentrate on PETH - and pass !)

I am sorry fot colleagues who are so demoralised that they dont wish to progress - I am in that boat - and I feel sorrier for those locked into this awful course....

Meema1

Is anyone studying for the synoptic using Kaplan resources?

gabandy

@annvboys when you resat in July did you have the same technical issues ?
Also am i the only one who completed and managed to down and upload everything without any issues ?
I found in my class there was a mix of people who work in an accounting role and are therefore using excel regulary, and others who didnt and tended to struggle just wondering whether this could be a reason for people running out of time.

Hayleybubs

gabandy I really don't think it made a difference for those that work in the accountancy field or not! In my college 23+ sat and only 2 passed. Neither work in accountancy field both are single mums at college. Most those that failed actually work in that area. The whole exam was a disaster! My tutor told me that less than 20% passed first time across the country.... 80%+ first time failure rate in the U.K. This year shows what a disgrace it was!!!!

Hayleybubs

Personally I will be doing level 4 but from what I've read in the forums it's really advanced and I will need to knuckle down and revise to stand a chance of passing x

gabandy

Fair enpugh it just seemed to be like that in our class thats all. Fingers crossed for my results on friday