[jeff]

We have a lot of “I took __ today threads” so to consolidate, here is the official thread.

Please – Not even a hint of exam disclosure per AICPA rules.

Links to other Exam Experience Threads:

AUD

REG

FAR

[Accountingbeans]

@farisfun The control environment is EBOCA (ethics, board oversight, organizational structure, commitment to competence, and accountability) while existing control activities deals with actual internal controls and policies. So I basically just think of it as: control environment is setting up the “tone at the top” and is the prerequisite to set things up ethically and the right way, then the control activities are the actual procedures to make sure that the set up environment (ethical and whatnot) is actually followed, in a more technical sense.

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong in this, but that's just the way that I think of them generall.

Newbie
BEC- August 31

[caotran]

I took BEC today. I can't tell the difference between the Testlet because I think they are all hard the same. The WC portion was not as scary as I thought.

[FARISFUN]

@Ashley Zeng I hope that it went well! I am just curious. I am currently using Becker study material and have noticed that a lot of the calculations take multiple steps. When I took FAR I was surprised at how much easier the calculations were on the exam then they were for Becker. Would you say the calculations are more straightforward on the exam?

[caotran]

My calculation questions are pretty straightforward, some are a little tricky but not too many steps. I would say conceptual questions challenged me more. Good luck.

[RE2PECT]

The calculation questions aren't paragraphs long like Ninja, but a lot of them weren't as straightforward imo. I had at least 5 that made you do extra steps that I never came across in any practice questions and one on a ratio I never even heard of.

FAR: 75 Roger & Ninja (notes/flashcards/audio/MCQ)
AUD: 73, 81
BEC: 71, retake 8/29
REG:

[caotran]

Same here. There was one ratio that I have never heard/ learned before so I used my best guess.

[Anonymous]

Took BEC this afternoon, there were quite a few MCQs that were confusing as usual, especially COSO/ERM/IT terminology. Make sure know your ratios, IT minutia and obviously COSO. Good luck all.

[DISLCPA]

Should I not waste my time knowing the performance measurement calculations in and out? I am retaking on the 17th and it looks like I need to focus on the IT and Econ. I am reviewing the risk management section right now.

BEC(8/12/16)
AUD
FAR
REG

[George]

Just took it this morning. It actually wasn't too bad. I don't know if that is good thing or not. I had a good mix of questions both conceptual and calculations. The WC i got were not bad at all as I knew enough to write a decent essay. I don't know if I should be worried or not.

[FARISFUN]

@CPAWarrior Maybe you were just really well prepared! Hope it went well. I take BEC a week from today so just going through my review process right now.

[George]

@FARISFUN Yeah I hope so, however I didn't come across a ratio that I never seen before that RE2PECT mentioned on his test. So I'm assuming I just got all medium testlets :/

Good luck on BEC next week FARISFUN. Make sure to know your mnemonics for every chapter. Memorizing them definitely helped me out on 2 or 3 problems.

[Accountingbeans]

Just took BEC earlier today. Not sure how to feel about it. My booklets went Medium-Hard-Medium (although the 3rd felt the easiest) so not entirely sure how to feel about that. As stated before, definitely know COSO, IT, ratios, variances.

Now to wait almost an entire month (November 4th) to get my score…

Newbie
BEC- August 31

[thelatebloomer]

I just took my first CPA exam in BEC. Overall I feel pretty good about it, but honestly I have nothing to compare to. The first testlet seemed really easy. The second was harder, but did not seem really hard. It was difficult to gauge the third, but it definitely wasn't the easiest. There were lots of COSO questions, and I definitely recommend memorizing COSO very well so you can get the easy points. There were also lots of IT questions, and I think I did well on them, but I see them as difficult to study for because they are collections of random bits of knowledge. The financial management and calculation questions were a lot easier than Ninja. I definitely over-stressed about the economics questions as well. I have no idea how to judge the written communications and I really have no idea where I stand. With that said, again overall I don't feel bad about it, other than the fact that I have to wait so long to see my score.

[me71too]

I left a message in the other thread. I took FAR today for the 1st time and it was my very first time to go to the testing center. I think I did ok.
I have BEC for 10/28 and I haven't event started studying. I will give it a try but I think I will not finish going through all the material. Any suggestions?

[Sticky Nicky]

depends on what materials you are using..BEC is a nightmare..u could probably do it in that time frame tho.. i half assed study for 3 weeks and got a 73 on the first take…mind you this was the first section and first test i sat for…ive been out of college for 3 years now so my habits weren't what they used to be…once you get rolling things will start to click after a while,,problem is there's too much randomness with this section…i used roger and ninja mcqs first time out,,this time i also went through all becker HW questions since i had an older copy, and some of wiley tbs also older copy…now im doing ninja again for final review and feel much more confident then i did a couple weeks back during my fail,,i honestly think the level of wiley was much harder than all of the other materials…basically every question was marked CMA adopted,,ratios ratios ratios!!

[Author]

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