ACCA F7 Financial Reporting

doorB10

Hi There, Im taking F7 ( Financial Reporting ) in Dec. Would anyone have any advice on this subject. It is proving very difficult and I have no idea where to start when studying. Appreciate this.

Femgem

Financial Reporting is indeed a pretty tough subject, the pass rate of June '07 was 44%.

Practice your consolidated accounts, you are guaranteed that question 1 will be a consolidated balance sheet but you might have a consolidated p&l thrown in there too. Also practice your cash flow statements and ratios and hopefully question 3 will be taken care of.

Regarding question 2 the same adjustments come up again and again so if you've practiced your past papers you will have seen probably about 80% of the adjustments before.

This is the new syllabus and you have to answer all 5 questions on the paper. The SSAPs and FRSs are a right pain in the ass but you need to know something about all of them as the chances are that question 4 and question 5 will be theory based.

As with all ACCA exams, the paper will cover the whole syllabus. Do not leave out any section, are you taking classes or home studying?

doorB10

Thanks for this very reasonable reply.

I am taking the classes with BPP. Dave Ahern is the lecturer. He seems to know his stuff but does not get students to practice questions in the lectures.

I have gone to most of the lectures but when it comes to study it is quite difficult.

It is hard to follow the flow of the answer and find where figures are coming from.

Is question 1 always a consolidated b/s or consolidate p&l or both together.?

seanieclarke

doorB10 wrote: »

I am taking the classes with BPP. Dave Ahern is the lecturer. He seems to know his stuff but does not get students to practice questions in the lectures.

sorry to gatecrash the thread but i just have a small question about bpp or any other ACCA locations.

about how many people do be in one class+do the classes be a few hours of cramming stuff in or are is it all done at a reasonable pace?

thanks

mkdon05

I Feel your pain op, im doing this subject in december too!

to Seanieclarke: I do it in DBS and the classes are 3.5 hours long. You fairly fly through the stuff alright to get it all covered in the 3 months of classes. Id say there is about 150 in my class.

animal

My 2-pence worth!
I passed my finals last year thanks be to God but they are tough going. I presume F7 is the old 2.5 and it is indeed a tough subject if you havent got much knowledge going into it. The Consol P&L /BS is crucial. I'm not sure if its still compulsory (I'm sure it's written at the front of your notes - ask the lecturer its not!) but regardless of whether its compulsory or not you'll need to learn how to do them anyway! you'll need to be able to do them backwards for your finals...
I too went to David Ahern in BPP and found his methods fantasic. A bit confusing at first but once you get the hang of it it's the quickest way possible. The manipulation of the FVNA, Minority interest and the Holding company's reserves are all thats to it! Again - crucial for your finals!
By doing the consol questions you'll be dealing with the adjustments on Financial instruments and Fixed Assets etc that can come up as individual scenario questions so much of the course flows from this.
I found practicing the same questions over and over again a good way to study. You may not get them right - even after doing the same question for the 10th time but you'll get very close and start to see where you make mistakes and all of the figures fall into place and do make sense.
Question practice is the best way. There's no real short cut i'm afraid. Start off with the basic examples from the notes or the easy exam questions. I seem to remember some of the questions being an awful lot more difficult than others. stick to the easy one's at first....
You'll also note that for that paper many of the adjustments repeat themselves from one question to the next. you can just learn where each fig goes to begin with and later on you'll understand it.
You should try to gain an understanding of what the consol accounts are trying to achieve. Once you get this understanding the idea of eliminating inter-co balances and the other tricky adjustments just make sense!!
Try to do a big weeks study before your revision course. The more knowledge you have going into it the more you'll get out of it. That goes for all subjects.

The Cashflow is another popular question and not a difficult one really. Again I think Davids methods were excellent. I remember the checklist well...

Best of luck with the study and hope the exams go well. It will be worth it in the end.

Another general point - DO NOT GIVE UP IN THE MIDDLE OF AN EXAM NO MATTER HOW BAD YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING.
I came out of every exam absolutely exhausted because i felt like i had to fight for every mark. I came out of a few thinking i may have failed them but i never failed one. A few 51's along the way and i think that getting over the line often hinges on keeping a cool head, watching your time keeping and get the easy marks.
One of the lads i worked with got 48 in the 2.5 exam in one sitting and said that he gave up with 35 minutes to go because he knew he had failed. What a plonker....

doorB10

The solid advice given above is good. F7 is the new syllabus for the old 2.5. There is now no choice in the exam. Con b/s, published a/c/s and maybe cashflow are questions 1,2 and 3. Im not sure what areas are covered in question 4 and 5. Financial standards do come up in these questions but not sure how.

Jgonzalez

I'm sure most of the revision courses are now over. Does anybody have any last minute tips as to what may or may not come up on the F7 paper?

Animal - What checklist did David Ahern use for the Cashflow statements?

Femgem

Jgonzalez, it's ACCA - there are no tips or hints!

kluivert

I had David Ahern for my finals in Dublin and found him to be pretty good. Best to sit near the front of the class though.

If your good he will give you his wisdom tricks for the consolidated accounts, which are pretty straight forward after practicising about 20 of them, over and over again.

I think the idea, is to give you the bases, and you to practice over and over, if yoru stuck, right down your queries and see David afterwards.

Cashflow is the same - he breaks the answer into different parts and then brings it together at the end for you.

I got exempt from 2.5 so I cant comment on the paper. But focus on the questions which will give you the most marks and make sure to answer all questions.

Good luck.

Climber

I've got this exam next week as well.
I think the main thing is do as many as past exam papers between now and then as possible. Once you feel it getting repetitive it means you're familiar with the style of questions and nothing much should surprise you on the day!

Good look everybody

lochie

Jgonzalez wrote: »

I'm sure most of the revision courses are now over. Does anybody have any last minute tips as to what may or may not come up on the F7 paper?

Animal - What checklist did David Ahern use for the Cashflow statements?

I am going to post this with a serious health warning. i am doing a subject distance learning and they sent me a list of exam tips so here there are but obviously these are only a guide. I am not doing F7 so dunno how accurate this is:



F7 – Financial Reporting
CBS or, slightly more likely, CPLA
Published Accounts with mixed standards
Interpretations or CFS, with latter more likely, maybe with bits of Interpretation
Standards with concepts, such as Leasing, DT, Construction contracts, Impairment, Depreciation with Revaluation, etc
Standards with concepts (other standards, standard setting, human assets, conceptual framework, etc)

Climber

Thanks Lochie.

I reckon it's possible to completely ignore Q4 (Long term contracts, leasing etc.) If we concentrate on Q1-3 (worth 75%) and Q5 should more than likely be a theory Q on the conceptual framework/standards (worth 10%), that gives us 85% studied and prepared for.

I think the items covered in Q4 are too complicated and could take up all your study time, even though you can only get 15% max from the Q

What do people think?

rainbow7

Hi guys,

I think the best everybody could do is to make sure he has got the best lecturer. Unfortunately I do not think I did get it for F7. You know the way how some of them care only for the money and that's it. So I would not recommend DBS & James Browne for F7. I have heart good comments for David Ahern (BPP) and David O'Donoghue (Griffith's College and Independent Colleges from now on I think). My personal opinion is that he knows his subject but can not or does not want to bother to help you in the best possible way!

Please share your experience! It is vital to get the best lecturers for the ACCA exams as they are tough and expensive anyway! It is not worth it to waste your time and to settle for something less than the best regarding the courses. What is more the prices are the same everywhere but obviously the quolity of teaching is different!

Climber

I must agree with 'rainbow 7' on your comments over James Browne in DBS. I had him for 1.2 last June and I was so dissatisfied with him as a lecturer that I switched to BPP and David Ahern for the Dec 07 F7 exam.

His American approach, 'let's all stand up and start clapping' etc was not a good approach and for his own sake he really needs to knock this on the head, or else he'll keep on loosing more students to BPP

Darzinho

Hi,

Do Irish students normally study the UK variant or the International variant? I'm planning to do a distance learning course for this exam but I'm not sure which one to order.

Femgem

They normally do the Irish version! Who are you doing the distance learning with?

Darzinho

Femgem wrote: »

Who are you doing the distance learning with?

BPP

cailinoBAC

Go with the UK version, that's what most people do. I mean, yes, it's the Irish version, but it's practically the same, they just use euro instead of pounds.

Darzinho

Is that the only difference? :eek:

Fidget

Just stumbled upon this board and thread. How did the people get on who were sitting F7 in Dec? Passes all round I hope!

Have just begun studing for F7 too. I'm doing it home study and sitting it in June. So far I'm finding the consolidated a/cs not too bad. I'm about done with the balance sheet and they did seem a bit confusing at first, but after doing plenty of questions, the format of it is imprinted in my brain now. Moving on to the consolidated P&L now.

Sterno

Update on DBS:

James is no longer teaching F7,.. I agree he would have been a wreck for me.

Gerry Fahey is teaching it now and he is brilliant. He tips on everything from what gets you marks to what does not get you marks as well as what questions to go for first and what will chew up time on the exam and should be left for when/if you have spare time. I will recommend him hands down.

As far as the international/Irish... there is a difference but mild. The Irish variant also involves areas of corporate law. It is the same exam as the international bar one of the small 4/5 point section c/d areas will be dropped for an Corp law Q. I accidentally signed up for Irish and am stuck with it :{

Sterno

Oh, my suggestion as well for all of you figuring out what classes to take... do F7 and P2 together. P2 is advanced F7 and a lot of it doubles up... its more like studying 1.5 classes vs: 2 distinct classes.. IE F7 teaches you IAS 36, and P2 teaches you IAS 36.... with a little more to it. We had a lot of students in my class doing this and I am jealous that I am not.