At many firms, the professional level exams are taken in two sets of three, however at my firm we take them two at a time. This reduces the stress massively and meant that I managed to maintain a good work/life balance right until the day of the exam and didn't have to spend entire evenings and weekends revising instead of seeing mates, which was greatly appreciated.
The way that the Professional Level courses work is that a month or two before the exams (which occur four times a year) there is a 'Tuition' course, followed by a 'Revision' course about a week before said exams. The gap between tuition and revision can vary anywhere between 3 and 6 weeks and how you use that time is up to the individual.
Financial Accounting and Reporting (FAR)
The first two exams I took were FAR and AA in June 2021. FAR is notoriously difficult and since starting the qualification I had heard a lot about how intense and hard FAR would be, so I was pretty nervous. Despite this, I also knew that people had made a big deal about A Levels, university exams and even the Certificate Level ACA exams and I'd always found them fine so tried to ignore the remarks. Needless to say, FAR definitely requires more time and patience than the Certificate Level exams and a lot of the initial question practice is just constant failure until you grasp the exam technique, after which it becomes (almost) enjoyable. My tuition provider was First Intuition, who were very good at setting out a plan with different questions to attempt throughout the different stages leading up to the exam.
Personally, I struggle to focus in lessons and learn a lot better independently when I am in the mood to revise, which led to me achieving a 23.5% in the mock. Nonetheless, I wasn't too phased as I know how to revise effectively and, following the advice of other colleagues, I revised for a couple of hours each week between the tuition and revision periods (which was about 6 weeks for me) and by the time revision came, I was feeling fairly confident in FAR and ended up achieving 79% in the second mock. I'd definitely recommend doing question practice before the Revision sessions as although it can be quite gruelling initially, once the concepts and exam technique finally click, the question practice it so much quicker and more enjoyable and the revision session is actually helpful (albeit quite slow as everyone is at very different levels).
My biggest advice for FAR would be to do the question practice online to simulate the exam software so that by the time the exam comes along you are proficient and can focus on solving the questions as opposed to dealing with the software. I would also recommend attending any revision sessions that are offered as they helped me to clarify any issues I had and establish a thorough exam technique. I'd also recommend highlighting and tabbing up the IFRS Standards in advance as this took much longer than anticipated - my technique was to highlight each (relevant) line in the contents page the same colour as the aligned tab which would correspond with that section.
My main worry with the Professional Level exams was how I was going to revise consistently over 2 months during Spring as before this I'd always been a crammer. I was constantly warned that the 2/3 weeks leading up to the FAR exam would be so stressful and that I'd be revising 24/7, whereas I didn't have a single free weekend between college and revision and I managed to achieve 75% in the exam. Admittedly, being in another lockdown over this period enabled me to focus much more than I otherwise would have, however as lockdown lifted, I always prioritised socialising and was busy training for a half marathon and house-hunting, showing that there is no need to be revising constantly and in fact it is counterproductive to be revising all the time without relaxing and seeing mates in between.
Audit and Assurance (AA)
As is the case with many students who take AA with FAR, I definitely neglected AA until revision and then panicked as the exam approached. AA is a much more wordy exam, meaning that it's much easier to blag your way through compared to FAR, and so although I did some practice questions for FAR between tuition and revision, I didn't look once at AA in that period. This meant that although I felt confident for FAR leading up to the exam, I was nowhere near as prepared for AA.
Nonetheless, I made sure to pay attention throughout the college and revision courses so I felt fairly knowledgable on the concepts. The AA exam consists of 4 questions; the first is various short form questions, followed by three longer questions, one of of which is assisted by 'Inflo' (a software). Although I didn't, I'd recommend doing some question practice with this software as it can be quite fiddly initially. Also, due to the wordy nature of this exam, I found it much harder to revise for compared to FAR as question practice was much more time-consuming and the mark scheme wasn't as straight-forward.
On the day of the exam, my exam centre had various issues with the exam, including a late start, the inability to access Inflo, and towards the end the inability to access the exam. Despite this, I managed to achieve 83% in the exam, however my time management was very poor and I spent far too long on the 'Audit Risk' question, leaving very little time for the last question with Inflo.
Tax Compliance (TC)
In December 2021, I took TC and FM. I had heard from senior colleagues that TC was much harder than FM so focussed on TC between Tuition and Revision, however as Revision approached, I definitely started to panic about FM as it relies on having done many practice questions, which I hadn't. Nonetheless, TC had significantly more content to understand and was much more complex, so required much more revision.
I had college for TC in late September, so took the opportunity to take it remotely from Albufeira, Portugal. This wasn't my most clever idea as I was staying with friends and exploring the town everyday after college, so I constantly got distracted during tuition and did no practice in the evenings. Regardless, as mentioned previously, I learn much more effectively through self-study and so I spent the weekends between tuition and revision watching the online videos and slowly teaching myself the content. It took a while for the concepts to actually stick in my head, as although they all made sense when I went through them, it was hard to know how they applied and their importance until I started practicing questions.
As with FAR, I roughly followed the revision plan provided by First Intuition and printed a spreadsheet with each question in the question bank and the timeframe in which to attempt each question, and highlighted each question as I completed it. The first few questions were very draining and difficult, however the online debriefs were extremely helpful and the more exposure I got to the questions, the more I got used to the format and proformas required. By the day of the exam, I was far from finishing the question bank, however I had anticipated this as I had a big work deadline in late November, as well as several holidays and events planned between September and December, so I wasn't too worried and despite having social commitments every weekend, I made sure to spend at least an hour or two most weekends doing a bit of revision over those weeks instead of cramming at the end. My biggest piece of advice would be to reserve a few hours in the morning each weekend to revise (while all your friends are in bed) and then filling your afternoons with social activities and downtime in order to recharge and refresh - this also prevents burning out or becoming overly stressed with work.
Although the first questions that you practice will be difficult, pushing through this is genuinely the best way to become familiar with the mark scheme and prepare you for the exam, and its definitely more worthwhile to attempt fewer questions (especially the ones with online debriefs which walk you through the solution) properly than rush through all of them - quality over quantity. Once again, I'd recommend practicing the questions on a computer in preparation for the exam, although this did strain my eyes occasionally and I had to take frequent breaks from screens after spending several hours each day looking at screens during work and additional hours on the weekend for revision.
Funnily enough, I achieved the highest score on a Kahoot quiz in my TC revision course and passed the mock, which relaxed me slightly and I felt fairly confident walking into the exam, although the questions I usually liked I found difficult and vice versa. In the end I achieved 75% in this exam.
Financial Management (FM)
My tuition tutor for FM was very monotone and their teaching style wasn't for me, which made it very hard for me to concentrate during the lessons (despite having returned to London after my trip to Portugal). Despite this, there was significantly less content compared with TC and I had been assured by colleagues that FM was very manageable. Therefore, I focussed heavily on TC and left the bulk of FM for the revision course, hoping that I'd having a very engaging tutor.
A couple of weeks before my FM exam, I spent the weekend in Nice, France for my dad's birthday and I thought the flight would be a great time to complete the 'gap mock exam', but ended up more stressed than ever when I opened the mock and didn't even understand what the question was asking me, let alone how to answer it. Despite this, I enjoyed the trip in the hopes of working hard during the revision course and miraculously picking it all up. Unfortunately, my tutor ended up being the same one that I had had for tuition. Usually I find revision extremely helpful for improving technique and question practice, however this wasn't the case with FM. Regardless, I did managed to practice some questions during this course and the predictable structure of the exam was made clear to me, allowing me to pass my revision mock and filling me with slightly more confidence for the exam. The tutor (correctly) predicted that business valuations would come up in the exam too, which allowed me to spend the week between revision and the exam focussing on this section, which I'd neglected beforehand.
I started to really enjoy FM leading up to the exam as question practice was fairly quick and the more wordy answers provided a bit of variety alongside the calculations. I achieved 79% in this exam and I would definitely recommend reading over the course notes a couple of times for FM as there are many theories and concepts to learn which aid with question practice greatly.
Business, Strategy and Technology (BST)
For my last two Professional Level exams (BST & BPT), I managed to watch all of the online videos prior to tuition in the hopes that by the time tuition came I would have a vague understanding of each topic, especially as I would be abroad for each tuition course, whereas for all prior exams I wouldn't pay any attention during tuition and would then teach myself all of the content afterwards.
I was also abroad a lot between tuition and revision, including in San Francisco, Hawaii, and Tunisia. This meant that unlike for the 4 previous professional level exams, I wouldn't be able to revise consistently in small chunks over the two months between college. Coming back from the US with only 2 weeks before revision made me realise how little I'd done compared with the other sittings but unlike usually, I actually managed to be very productive within this time and even revised over the Jubilee bank holiday (which was tragic but provides an idea of how motivated I was). That said, I of course continued to socialise (albeit less than usual), go on my runs, and relax as I think it's counterproductive to just revise 24/7 during exam season.
I spent tuition in Italy with my boyfriend, which was incredible but meant that I didn't focus so much during class. This was especially due to the fact that the content for BST is largely common sense, which is confirmed by the exceptionally high pass rates. That said, for my sitting there was a new marker and we were told that the ICAEW wanted to increase the difficulty of the exam to lower the pass rate. There was also a lot more maths compared to previous years.
To revise for BST, I read the course notes and made very brief notes of the key models and equations, and then read those over a couple of times before the exam. That said, the actual exam incorporated barely any models and throw me (and many others) completely off as it was unlike the practice questions that I'd done. Luckily, I still passed with 68%.
Business Planning: Taxation (BPT)
Despite being in Portugal for BPT tuition, I actually managed to focus throughout the vast majority of the course as there were only six students so everyone was forced to participate.
I definitely focussed on BPT as BST was a lot of common sense and BPT is known for being one of the most difficult exams of the qualification and I managed to at least attempt every question in the question bank, although the first few questions I had a go at could barely constitute attempts. This exam is open book, meaning that you don't actually have to learn the content so much as knowing where to find it in your notes and how to apply it. With enough practice, by the time the exam comes around, you will likely feel fairly confident going into BPT.
There's a wide scope of content and even during revision there were some topics that I was confused about, however I managed to pass the class mock and felt quite motivated with BPT. I found the exam decent and ended up achieving 74%, passing comfortably considering that I'd been abroad for a significant part between tuition and revision.
As all of the revision materials are online, it means that a lot of time is spent looking at a screen during revision, especially given that the work day is also spent behind a screen. I found that my eyes hurt a lot more during revision than usually.
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