ACCA F6
WHAT STYLE DO THE F6 (UK) EXAMINATION QUESTIONS TAKE?
Within Section A, candidates will be required to answer 15 object test questions of 2 marks each. These questions may be either narrative or computational and can cover any areas of the syllabus.
Section B of the exam consists of three questions comprising five objective test items worth two marks each; therefore each question is worth a total of ten marks. Each question will be based around a common scenario "case" which can come from any area of the syllabus, and will be a mix of computational and narrative.
Section C of the exam comprises one 10 mark question and two 15 mark questions. The two 15 mark questions will focus on income tax and corporation tax and are likely to require candidates to perform a number of calculations or workings and then to bring these together into an overall tax computation. Questions in Section C will be predominantly computational, although each question may contain written elements.
The 10 mark question in Section C can cover any area of the syllabus
HOW SHOULD CANDIDATES REVISE FOR F6 EXAMINATIONS?
Effective revision involves plenty of question practice.
There is no substitute for practising exam-standard questions under exam conditions. If candidates find that they cannot complete the questions in the permitted time, then maybe they need to look at how they are presenting their answers. Are they wasting time by giving unnecessarily detailed workings or explanations, or are they providing information that is not required?
It is important that candidates cover everything in the syllabus when revising because F6 is a compulsory paper and they do not want to find themselves having to answer a question on a topic for which they have not revised.
However, some topics are more important than others since they are examined more frequently.
The F6(UK) examiner's approach article on the website lists the syllabus areas that you can expect to see most frequently examined.
WHAT IS IMPORTANT IN THE EXAMINATION ITSELF?
It is important not to rush straight into answering a question but to spend a few minutes planning your answer.
For example, if you are dealing with a capital gains tax question involving a husband and wife, your planning would include identifying exempt disposals so as to not waste any time performing unnecessary calculations; identifying jointly-held assets as it is easier to calculate these gains first; deciding on the layout of your answer using appropriate headings; and deciding on which workings can be included as part of the main computation and which will have to be dealt with separately.
WHICH FINANCE ACT WILL BE EXAMINABLE IN THE FTX (UK), F6 (UK) AND P6 (UK) EXAMS IN SEPTEMBER AND DECEMBER 2016 AND JUNE 2017?
Finance Act 2015 will be examinable in the September 2016, December 2016 and March 2017 exam sessions. Finance Act 2016 will be examinable in the June 2017, September 2017, December 2017 and March 2018 exam sessions.
WHY DO THE UK TAX PAST EXAMS USE TAX QUESTIONS RELATING TO OLD TAX YEARS?
The past exam questions and solutions published on the ACCA website appear as they did when the exams were first set. This is clearly stated on the website at the top of the page where the past papers are found.
The specimen exams and past papers have not been updated for any changes in legislation or standards, nor any syllabus or question amendments. Thus, they must be used with caution when preparing for current examinations. The exams are indicative of the level of difficulty and the style of questions that can come up in an exam.
The same applies to the tax variant papers, although these will have been based on the legislation for that country at the time they were written.
Updated versions of the questions and solutions, can be obtained by purchasing an Exam kit or Practise and Revision kit from one of ACCA's Approved Content Providers.
TO WHAT EXTENT ARE F6 (UK) CANDIDATES EXPECTED TO PROVIDE EXPLANATORY NOTES WITH THEIR COMPUTATIONS, PARTICULARLY IN THE CASE OF PROFIT ADJUSTMENT QUESTIONS?
Where a requirement within Section C only asks for a calculation or computation then there are no marks allocated to the provision of supplementary explanatory notes.
However, candidates should understand the difference between the workings which are required to show how they have arrived at their figures and written notes which do not add anything further to the figure (or zero) provided.
Candidates are advised to refer to recent answers published on our website where essential content for which marks are available and supplementary information for which marks are not available are indicated (where marks are not available they are called ‘Tutorial notes' and are written in italics).
WHAT ADVICE WOULD THE EXAMINERS GIVE TO CANDIDATES WHO REALISE THAT THEY HAVE MADE AN ERROR IN THEIR CALCULATIONS?
Do not spend valuable time re-writing the whole computation or an extensive working such as a capital allowances schedule for a single error within Section C.
Annotate the incorrect figure or the point at which the initial error was made and make a note at the end of the computation or question identifying the nature of the error or the correct treatment.
THERE HAS BEEN A SHIFT IN RECENT F6 (UK) EXAMS TOWARDS MORE ‘THINKING TYPE' QUESTIONS. IS THIS LIKELY TO CONTINUE?
Yes, this is designed to provide candidates with an introduction to the type of questions they will answer in P6 (UK).
WILL INHERITANCE TAX (IHT) BE EXAMINED AT EVERY SITTING FOR F6 (UK)?
Whilst this cannot be guaranteed, candidates should be prepared to be examined on all of the relevant taxes within the syllabus at each sitting.
IN F6 (UK), WILL CANDIDATES BE REQUIRED TO KNOW ABOUT ISSUES OF DOMICILE, THE TREATMENT OF FOREIGN ASSETS, INHERITANCE TAX (IHT) PLANNING AND THE ADMINISTRATION AND PAYMENT OF IHT?
Tutors and candidates should refer to the examining teams two-part article on IHT on the website for guidance, as IHT will not be examined beyond the topics covered in the article at the F6 (UK) level.
WILL ANY ASPECTS OF THE INTERACTION BETWEEN CAPITAL GAINS TAX (CGT) AND INHERITANCE TAX (IHT) BE EXAMINED IN THE F6 (UK) PAPER?
Although there is no intention to examine the interaction of capital taxes at F6 (UK) level, the two taxes could be examined within the same question and the information given could be relevant to both taxes.
THE APPROACH TO EXAMINING THE F6 SYLLABUS STATES THAT THE PAPER WILL BE PREDOMINANTLY COMPUTATIONAL. HOW ARE THE MARKS IN THE PAPER SPLIT BETWEEN COMPUTATIONAL AND NON-COMPUTATIONAL?
All marks on the F6 papers can be grouped into 3 categories:
- (i) those which are clearly computational;
- (ii) those which are for written explanations to support or
justify numbers within the computation; - (iii) those which are for definite theory or freestanding
written questions or multiple choice questions.
It is the combination of (i) and (ii) that will be regarded as computational, and these combined will always be greater than 50%.
In those cases where explanations are required to support calculations or workings, the detailed marking scheme will clearly show these explanations being awarded marks, and these marks, combined with those in the computation, will be regarded as computational. Where any explanations are not necessary from candidates in the exam, but are provided for guidance to future candidates, they will be shown as tutorial notes.