[barnold]

Has anyone else taken the same section on both the old version and the new version?

Just took FAR today with the new exam changes. I had taken FAR before, about a year+ ago on the old exam. The exam I took today felt a LOT harder than the one I had before. The main reasons were because time management was more difficult being that there were more SIMS and the SIMS were broken up, and also because frankly even the MCQs were just longer on average. Not feeling good about my chances. If I get a 75 then praise God, but I’m going to be signing up for a retake in August anyways just in case so I can minimize the chances of having one of my other sections expire.

BEC - 69, 77, 83
AUD - 63, 68, 70, 79
REG - 69, 63, 70
FAR - 60

[SallyCPA]

How were the sims? and was there a lot of NFP in MCQ?

BTW How can you sign up for a retake in august? Dont you have to wait until the score comes out first?

[gicenter27]

I took FAR yesterday. I didn't think the TBS content was that bad, but I got 5 Document Review questions which took up a lot of time. And with the TBS's now being separated time management is almost impossible because you don't know what to expect. I got 3 DRQs in my last packet, it sucked. But again, I didn't think the content was too difficult for it.

[SallyCPA]

Any recommendations for budgeting time? Like what time requirements did you use for each section?

[barnold]

Yeah most of my sims were document review with multiple tabs of “additional info” to factor into the already lengthy main page. I think one had 6 tabs and another had 5.. lol. Only had one research question, but it was one of the harder ones I've run into on any exam section for some reason.

There was some NFP, but not much, maybe like 3 questions. There was a little more governmental than NFP.

Unfortunately if I do have to wait until the score is released then my BEC might expire. It expires like 8/27 or something.

I didn't use any proper time budgets, although I probably should have. In general I would say ideally spend an average of like 1.5 minutes per mcq. Other than that, just get through the sims as fast as possible. I had 8, but I think they said it can go up to 9?

BEC - 69, 77, 83
AUD - 63, 68, 70, 79
REG - 69, 63, 70
FAR - 60

[Anonymous]

Seems like a lot of people are getting a ton of DRS! Any tips on how to prepare for them?

[gicenter27]

Yeah, I had a really difficult research question too. I felt like the ones I got on AUD and REG before 04/01 were much more straight forward. As far as studying for DRS's, no. Like I said it wasn't really that the content was that hard, it just took FOREVER to get through the three paragraphs of info and then the 5-8 documents just to answer a question.

[PugMafia]

I didn't take the old FAR but I took the new one yesterday and I had A TON of NFP/GOVT – I mean I would say it was 40% of my MCQ. Sounds crazy, but the breakdown is off IMO.

It was my first CPA exam and I was kind of frustrated at how the exam was so zoomed in (at least at my testing center, don't know how standard that is). That sounds like such a petty thing to complain about but I spent a lot of time scrolling and scrolling, double checking to make sure I didn't get anything off. I think that could be an easy thing to adjust to help save time because the hours go by so fast.

Good luck everyone!

[barnold]

@PugMafia Hah.. I hear you. The constant scrolling up and down on the sims is annoying.

@Caueen123 I would agree with others – I can't think of a way to study specifically for DRS's.. I mean unless you have some to practice.. but the real issue is indeed the amount of time they take. So I think the key, unfortunately, is to just know your crap as well as you can, and make decisions and move swiftly.

BEC - 69, 77, 83
AUD - 63, 68, 70, 79
REG - 69, 63, 70
FAR - 60

[Cruzer]

I got 5 DRS's and have taken FAR in old format and had 1 DRS. Tons of information to sort through but was able to allocate enough time where I was able to understand what they were asking. Reminds me of real life work experience when going through some of the docs. The topics I received were not overly complex and I felt confident on the DRS's. One I found with help of the AL only.

[Anonymous]

The AICPA will no doubt be looking at the amount of DRS's that they give to a particular candidate (or the average candidate) and if they gave you FIVE of those suckers, and you only managed to do well on a couple of them, then I'd hope it wouldn't be counted against you. I had one and only one easy DRS when I did FAR the last time. It was the one question, other than the research one, that I know I did well on. The other non-DRS's were just crazy and brutal and two of them I know I completely missed and got zero points on because I would've needed an hour each to do them.
Having sat multiple times now, I have seen a trend – the DRS's usually aren't *that* bad. They won't give you so much that you absolutely can not do it in a reasonable amount of time.
Or – if they are doing that to people, I just haven't personally seen it on my own tests. The best way to get good at DRS's is obviously just to do as many for practice as you can get your hands on. I worked almost all the ones in Roger and found them very helpful to work through. They are set up *exactly* like the ones on the CPA exam – he must have a guru who takes the exams just to see the format! haha

[Jj]

@crazyleon have you taken the new format?

[MommyCPA]

Took far on May 25th and feel awful. Mcqs we're long and WORDY. Some I wasn't even sure what they were asking/were it was coming from. I didn't get as far as I wanted in the ninja mcqs so maybe I just didn't get there in the material.

Sims were painful as one I had never done before or seen! So that's gonna hurt. 🙁 hopefully a pretest. others I'm not sure if I was supposed to put ‘zero's in the blanks or just leave them blank? Drop downs did not have options of ‘no entry' etc. But after reading some responses it sounds like it varied based off of what the question was answering…great. I had two DRS- which had a lot of data to sift through but feeling okay about knowing what they were asking for. Also had one research question that I know I got right.

I did 45/45/30/break/65/55. I had time left over at the end but probably because I was clueless on my first SIM. I really loved the break and am grateful they added it. Breaking up the sims does screw with your time management thats for sure

[Natalierose]

I just took FAR yesterday and I felt like it was quite a bit harder.

My biggest issue with the new sims is that all of your supporting documents are on another tab, and you can't highlight or mark them up like I would in real life.

I would never do a bank rec without ticing stuff off- highlighting something that was posted incorrectly ect….

I feel like they should allow you to open these documents in the excel in the exam or have paper copies should you so choose.

I ended up wasting a lot of time writing down on my two dry erase sheets the details of each memo, email, document provided to do the question so that I'd be able to mark which I addressed, have all info visible with the actual form you needed to fill out, ect.

REG- Passed
BEC- Passed
AUD -Failed - Retake in October
FAR- Scheduled 8/1/2016

[Anonymous]

You can sign up before you know your score?

I am too scared to look at the IL board website because I took mine the day before my AUD credit expired.

Either way I feel the exact opposite as you do. I felt the test was easier for the following reasons

DRS – I would say the DRS sims are almost as easy as the research sims. I cant remember if they each have 5 or 6 questions per DRS but of the two I received, I was only unsure of 1 question each (and I still think I got one of them right).

Less wordy – In my experience both the sims and the MCQs were less wordy.

Sims being 50% – I don't know about you but I seem to do better on sims than MCQs. Mostly because you can earn partial credit. When I took FAR in Q4 2016 I got a 72. My score breakdown said I was comparable with Sims but fell short on MCQs.

I also think I lucked out on GNP. I had like 10 questions most of them easy.

I hope I passed because that would mean I am DONE! (finally). Plan on getting my license so I can apply to regional CPA firms (RSM, BDO, etc) in time for January hires.

[Anonymous]

@Beantown23 yes I have taken the new format and the old format. 🙂

[Author]

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