[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

[NeedsA75]

OK, took BEC this morning. Trying to stay positive as I was able to get through the entire exam without leaving any WC blank.

COSO and IT were pretty brutal. I knew IT would be random, and it was. COSO I studied very thoroughly and was still tricky because of the way the problems were worded.

Investments and Econ were pretty straightforward IMO. Same with the WC. I feel like I put together relevant and concise answers on all of them so hopefully those boost my grade.

My third testlet was incredibly wordy and seemed more difficult than the first two.

I'm really not trying to stress because I genuinely thought I failed my REG retake in October and wound up scoring high. I feel like the grading really is a crap shoot and depends on how the rest of the people who took the exam in your testing window scored.

Trying not to freak out. Feel like I did enough to pass but won't be surprised either way..

[passthisthing]

I took BEC today and man it was not what I was expecting. My test did not get lenghty at all and some just seemed so random. Except for a couple questions, the questions were short. I couldn't wait to get some of the questions from the hot/frequently tested topics,but I didn't get much at all. Very little calcs. I was a bit bummed that the question didn't get wordy and I overanalyzed a few questions because they seemed so straightforward I thought I was falling for a trap. I did decent on one WC, one I tried my best and in the last one actually rushed and put a few sentences in before time ran out. Im probably the only one out there that came close to running out of time in BEC.

If there is a miracle, I can sure use one for this part. What shot my confidence was feeling good about AUD, with average and trending in the 80s and still failing, and with how BEC turned out,I can only hope now.

[NeedsA75]

Honestly, I wouldn't worry about questions being lengthy. I do think I got a harder 3rd testlet but I don't think you can read into that too much. When I retook REG I felt the same way you do about BEC. Short, random MC all the way throughout with no real difference in difficulty and you can see how that turned out for me.

I did get some short random questions but man, the first half of the third testlet every other question was a paragraph long. It did shorten back up but definitely caused me to run a little tight on time finishing the WC. I was typing until the last minute w/out much time for a proof read. I did feel fairly confident about what I put down though…I won't be surprised either way given my past exam experiences…

[passthisthing]

@NeedsA75 – Thanks, I'm still hoping to sneak by with an early holiday miracle. One thing I did notice is that I'm more over analytical during the exam than in practice which might explain the high avg/trending in NINJA (not from many repeats) but fail scores on the real thing. I feel if its too easy/straightforward, I double guess/re-check and that might lead to the wrong answer, which means the hard stuff I see at home never shows up on the exam as I'm still strolling through the mediums. I hope I can look back at this post next week and laugh at myself. I wish you the best on BEC and the upcoming AUD.

[NeedsA75]

I'm the same way. The practice questions usually feel much harder than what you see on the exam. That's not to say that the questions on the exam can't be down right tricky or random but feel they are generally more straight forward from a computation perspective. This generally leads me to believe I didn't get a difficult testlet or second guessing my answers.

[RandomRandy]

I feel exactly how you guys felt. Took my exam yesterday too. Compared to Becker the questions were a lot shorter and a lot more straight forward. I can't tell if my questions were getting harder or not because they all seemed to be a “you know it or you don't” kind of thing. Very different experience than FAR so I am worried i got all easy testlets :/

FAR: 74 1/15/16, 72 7/2/16 -_-
BEC: TBD
REG: TBD
AUD: TBD

"Nothing is impossible to him who will try" - Andy Bernard

[cpaMD86]

I just took my BEC exam. The exam definitely beat me up. There were a lot of calculation questions with obscure conceptual questions. I couldn't really tell if it got progressively harder because I felt it was tough as whole. Going into it I felt pretty confident…I was trending at about 90% with Ninja MCQ, but some of the topics and questions seemed so foreign on my exam. I am hoping for at least a 75…I hope they show me mercy and I pass.

FAR: 9/3

[NeedsA75]

Which areas did you feel like there were obscure conceptual questions? I felt like the obscurity mostly came in the form of IT questions on my exam

[tygolfer]

Very similar experience to you guys. I felt like a lot of my questions were the you know it or you don't variety. A lot of obscure IT questions I wasn't completely sure about. None of my computation questions were very complex, which had me worrying that I got all easy testlets and somehow tanked it even tho I felt much better leaving the test center than I did for FAR. I still thought it could have gone either way…got my score yesterday. Wishing you guys the best of luck!

[cpaMD86]

@needsa75

Same for me…IT and some COSO. I honestly felt better coming out for FAR and AUD. I feel like I need a Christmas Miracle for this one…I had a good grasp on the material as I studied…but the application just didn't translate to the questions due to the way they were presented. I need a 75!

FAR: 9/3

[Power thru]

Took the exam today. Personally, I felt that I had more calculation questions as opposed to conceptual questions. I had an IT question that was definitely not covered in the BEC lecture so I was pretty thrown off by that. The WC wasn't too bad, just make sure you know some of the BEC topics in depth. Hoping to get a 75 at least, but I felt pretty defeated after the exam…sorry to be a debbie downer. Good luck everyone!

[ImmoKnight]

Well… My final exam and that was quite the experience. I have taken 4 exams already… (REG twice) and the uneasiness with which I exit the testing center doesn't get easier.

Testlet 1 – I enjoyed myself. Maybe 3 or 4 I wasn't sure on…

Testlet 2- in one word… Wow! I spent 42 minutes on it and if I didn't stop myself… I probably could've spent the rest of my time there as well. The questions weren't just tricky… They were downright monstrous. I haven't felt that defeated by a testlet since Auditing… I think I was sure on about 5 and the rest were educated guesses and eliminations.

Testlet 3- this was a lot better for me … Harder than 1 but no where near as brutal as 2. It was manageable and fair for the most part. Some random questions were thrown in that I just had to make educated guesses on and move on.

WC—- I kept hearing this isn't that hard… Well. I got hard ones. They were specific and difficult. I had my experience on other exams to fall back on but I feel bad for those that didn't. I wanted vague concepts that I could expand on and instead I get specific situations that I need to clarify…

Eh… I don't know how to feel overall. If I didn't know that it got harder because I did well then I would be on the ledge like with Auditing where I was 1000% sure I failed and then was amazed by my grade.

That 2nd testlet though… If I spend another 2 months on the material… I still don't think I could get the answers that they were looking for.

AUD: 85 (3/8/16)
FAR: 77 (6/7/16)
BEC: ??? (9/7/16)
REG: ???

[NeedsA75]

Can you give an example of the degree of difficulty on the calculations you saw on your second testlet? Don't give any direct examples obviously. Just speak in generalities and compare the test questions to some ninja or becker questions you saw in your prep. For example, would you compare it to a ninja mcq where you had to calculate out a long NPV problem or something of the like?

[Nessie]

I sat for BEC a couple of days ago. Just like FAR and AUD, there wasn’t a single question that resembled anything in Necker or Ninja (typo I'm going to keep 🙂 ). And like the others said, it was very conceptual. I’m not surprised. If I was a person who made up CPA questions, the first thing I would do is go over the study providers’ question and make sure there were no questions that resembled their respective question banks.

To the above poster. I would describe the questions as short, but deadly!

REG Aug 20/15: 88
AUD: Feb 29/16: 80
FAR: Jun 10/16: 80
BEC?

Becker self-study, Becker Final Review & NINJA MCQS

[ImmoKnight]

I have this problem whereby I tend to forget everything after I walk out of that testing center… it's rare for me to remember much because the experience is so traumatic (Clearly).

However, from what I do remember… it wasn't any calculations that made it so very difficult. The questions were just like nothing I have seen in any of my review courses (I did around 2000 MCQ of Gleim and about 700 of Ninja). It wasn't covered in any of them… or if it was, it didn't cover it in the way the question was phrased.

I really don't know how to explain it other than that. Eliminating choices was so hard to do because they all seemed plausible depending on how you take the question and each answer.

I hope that clarifies it a bit. Sorry.

AUD: 85 (3/8/16)
FAR: 77 (6/7/16)
BEC: ??? (9/7/16)
REG: ???

[Author]

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