ECR Mon 18 June 2007

System
System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
edited 10:32AM in AAT student discussion
I have completed the paper and will ask for volunteer proof readers next week.

I thought the tasks were generally fair, although I do plan to draw attention to some tasks where I feel the exam is not in line with the unit standards. I will be attending the SE regional meeting for AAT lecturers next Friday to raise these points.

The next point is one I have not been alone in making in the past.
Please can future ECR papers be laid out so that overhead analysis tasks give the data on a page that the candidate can see when completing the table. This time, candidates needed to be flipping backwards and forwards as the table was on the reverse of the data [pages 7 and 8]

I liked the limiting factor question. It was different from previous tasks on this topic and had a sensible layout. This should enable a competent student to think about it in general terms and them to follow the table provided.

I don't understand why 5 decimal places were needed for the PV factors, but a net present cost question was a fair way to test discounted cash flows.

This paper gets my thumbs up overall

sandy.hood@chichester.ac.uk

Comments

  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    From what I remember of the paper, which is rapidly becoming a distant memory, I found it pretty fair but for some reason, more challenging than any of the eight past papers I did before it. One thing I certainly f* f* fouled up on was the last one - while I am quite familiar with NPV I have NEVER seen a question put like this so I had no idea how to tackle it. I am sure that a quick ten minute explanation would have been enough for me to be able to solve it but it was not covered in BPP course book nor was it covered in class by the tutor so I feel a little cheated - I also feel I may not be alone. Apart from that, fingers crossed I'll be OK.

    Kevin :roll:
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    No you are not alone!
    We NEVER touched on it either!
    I think appeal is in order!
    How'd we go about this !?
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    Neither did we, I found ut really unfair to just PLONK in a question on net presant cost, when it looks like no one has been taught it!!!

    It wasn't in the BPP books, its wasn't in the osbourne books, it wasn't in ANY of the past papers.

    The only good point to PLONKING it in the paper was that it was right at the end!! I thin kif it was at the beginning I'd have had a major panic and would have been wondering what else they were going to DROP on us UNEXPECTEDLY!!

    Rather unfair to just drop a question like that on us when it wasn't in any of the text books.

    Rant over. sorry
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    I definitely didn't study it either!! I had Osbourne Books. I am just telling myself that if the answers to that were poor overall then the AAT will take that into consideration when marking them!!
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    Are we allowed to ask how your meeting went Sandy?
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    It went well
    All the points I made were agreed.

    And the AAT representative took the comments back as well

    It is interesting, that sometimes the issues that get the most coverage here on the discussion forum are not the ones pedantic lecturers such as I kick up a fuss about.

    I maintain, the exam should not go beyond the standards whether the examiner thinks you should know something that is beyond the standards or not.
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007
    SandyHood wrote:
    I maintain, the exam should not go beyond the standards whether the examiner thinks you should know something that is beyond the standards or not.

    If this is happening, then surely the AAT should take this into account during the marking process i.e. ignore the areas which should not have been examined.

    It is worrying that examiners have the potential to examine more than what is actually required.

    Steve.
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    peugeot

    I know you produced your answer to DFS, did you find it assessed the DFS standards only?

  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    Hi Sandy,

    I didn't compare it to the standards though I know from a few PM's I've had there are a couple of issues which students (rightly or wrongly) have.

    From the information I gleaned from comments posted on threads and PM's I think the problems students encountered were:-

    - difficulty in referring the tasks to the relevant accounting standards (e.g. IAS 18 - Revenue and IAS 2 - Inventories)

    - it would seem a lot of students "question spotted" i.e. thought a consolidated balance sheet would come up and focused their revision on this when, in fact, it was a consolidated income statement

    - confusion as to what to do with the loss on disposal of a business

    - Difficulty in arriving at figures to go in the cash flow statement e.g. calculating the actual additions to fixed assets (I think the disposal may have confused a few here).

    I did refer to the standards because one student was going to appeal because they hadn't been shown IAS 18 at college. This is, however, in the standards.

    On balance, however, I thought it was a pretty fair paper - nothing was in there that I thougth wasn't appropriate to a Technician level student (though doubtless there will be some out there that will disagree with me!)

    Kind regards
    Steve
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    If someone took the exam without knowing the standards I don't think the assessor can be held accountable.

    Those who attend any type of class I run have a copy of the standards and we go through them to match what we have done in terms of exercises.

    I imagine most lecturers do that. If someone has a lecturer who doesn't, I'd recommend looking at the standards as part of the exam preparation. They are in the student record, and copies are available on this website.
    For Technician:
    http://www.aat.co.uk/servlet/file/Technician_record.pdf?ITEM_ENT_ID=696&ITEM_VERSION=1&COLLSPEC_ENT_ID=34
    For Intermediate:
    http://www.aat.co.uk/servlet/file/intermediate_record.pdf?ITEM_ENT_ID=694&ITEM_VERSION=1&COLLSPEC_ENT_ID=34

    sandy.hood@chichester.ac.uk
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    I thought the paper was mostly ok. The first question needed a bit of careful reading. I think some people, put the cost per unit in £ (rounded to decimal points) instead of in pence (rounded to two decimal points) and this led to them answering LIFO. All the practise exams had it in £, so I can understand why this tripped people up and I very nearly did the same thing.

    The only thing I have to say is that the study books (such as the osborne one) need updating to briefly mention Net Present Cost. I think if there was a small paragraph on it, followed by a worked example in the book, then most people would have been happy with the last question.
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    I wonder if we are getting a little pedantic here regarding wording.

    Surely net present value is a fairly general term which would incorporate the discounting of both revenues and costs.

    In this question there were only costs to consider, so the term was revised to net present cost.

    I do agree that the AAT should avoid confusion wherever possible, but appropriate use of the word cost rather than value is surely not a huge issue?
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    In reply to Andy

    The difference in the wording DOES make a difference.

    I had only ever been shown and taught about NPV and never ever told that it could be done with cost only. If people had been made aware of this then they wouldn't be discussing it on here.

    Maybe you are just one of the lucky ones who were aware NPC existed - don't make others feel bad if they haven't - it isn't fair :cry:
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    peugot which college do you teach at?im going to move on to my cima if i pass dfs this time and want to know if you teach at college near hounslow.
  • System
    System Posts: 100,534 🤖 Admin 🤖
    Re:ECR Mon 18 June 2007

    Hi Dipak,

    I am not a tutor but I'm sure the tutors at your college will be of a high standard.

    Kind regards
    Steve

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