[Anonymous]

I’m putting together my schedule for the last couple of weeks of Audit prep, and am wondering if I should spend some time reviewing SIMS in the Wiley test bank? For FAR, I only reviewed the SIMS in the Wiley book but never did any from the test bank. Just trying to figure out if I can skip those for Audit as well. Thanks.

[R. Baker]

It wouldn't hurt to do a few just to get comfortable with how you will need to input answers for different types of questions and get some practice using the research literature to get a feel for the structure of SAS/AT/SSARS/etc.

Other than that it's probably better to focus on MCQ instead of sims

Illinois CPA

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your reply!

[Anonymous]

no you don't need to review the sims, unless you feel like you have to have to. MCQs are much more important, just my opinion, good luck!!

[Anonymous]

Awesome – just what I wanted to hear. I hate practicing SIMS, but can live with MCQ's. Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Look over the ones from each chapter to know the format. I would say that the formats are similar to what you will see but subject content….nuh uh no way.

Oh and do all the research sims. The reason is that I did one out of Wiley and found that I was wrong. It asked for something about the guidance an auditor would use when issuing an opinion. I found the actual paragraph which stated what the auditor should do and got it wrong. It wanted the actual opinion example instead.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your helpful advice, CPAPending! I am really nervous about these Audit SIMS for some reason.

[Anonymous]

They weren't as bad as I feared, I apparently did okay because I scored an 87 overall.

My advice on the approach is to just go through them as the come. Work them once and then go back through them to clean up anything you missed or left blank.

Also, remember that you can actually use the research function on all SIMS. In fact, the research function helped me on two sims. If I hadn't screwed up my break schedule and had to pee so bad I thought I was going to die….I might have made 90 or higher by researching the questions more.

Use the research function on all the SIMs you can.

[Anonymous]

Sorry to say my sims were horrible this last time around, not so bad the time before. I believe that the sims were what caused me to fail the exam and I regret not spending more time practicing them, I only reviewed a few of them. I concentrated on theory and learning the material and I knew the material but I wasn't prepared for my sims at all. So that being said for this FIFTH ATTEMPT at auditing (yes I said fifth :-)), I'm not following the advice to not worry about sims and I'm going to practice as many as I can along with pounding out the mcq's. My score report showed stronger in two content areas, comparable in two content areas and weaker in two areas. Comparable on mcq's and weaker on sims. This time I'll probably get easy ones just because I plan on spending more time studying them, lol!

[Anonymous]

Sorry, can you tell I'm a little ticked off at the auditing exam? 😉 I've had easy sims on some where I was able to use the research tabs but that last one for me was a killer and the research did not help me any at all. The one I took a couple of months before, I was able to use the research on all of them but I think I didn't have the theory down quite enough on the MCQ's for that one.

Good luck apbandj! Maybe you and I can nail auditing this time around!

[Anonymous]

Thanks CPAPending and bnrhilton. I think a lot of it depends on what SIMS you get. I remember reading on here about FAR SIMS and then when I saw them on the exam, I couldn't understand why everyone thought they were that brutal. I ran out of time to finish them, but I at least knew what they wanted me to do. But I'm thinking I just got lucky on those and won't be so lucky on Audit. A lot of the SIMS in the Wiley book just involve picking from a list of say, 10 items, instead of 4 like in MCQ's. It just seems like the ones on the exam would be much more involved than that.

Good luck to you, too bnrhilton! What day are you taking it? I have a feeling this is going to be the hardest section for me to get through b/c it's so subjective. I'm much better with facts and calculations!

[katiekanton]

I took AUD in November, and just sat for FAR. I think there's a certain amount of luck to which sims you get, since I heard of some people getting a sim over something simple like whether there's a direct or inverse relationship between control risk and detection risk, and I got a sim like “the more obscure points of auditing hedges” (these are not the the actual sims, I just use them for illustration, and it may be a slight exaggeration… but only very slight).

The sims I just had on FAR were tough but 5 of the 6 were reasonable compared to what I saw on AUD. I would say the AUD sims were so difficult as to border on the ridiculous, compared to the FAR sims. Again, though, it's probably just the luck of the draw which ones you get.

AUD - 88
FAR - 90
REG - 85
BEC - 88

[Anonymous]

@apbandj, I haven't scheduled it yet but am planning for the first week of April. Already took it once this window. I need to apply for a new NTS.

[Author]

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