[jeff]

This is for people taking their exams in the April/May 2010 testing window.

Recommended prep time for REG is 5-6 weeks @ 20 hours a week.

Study Notes: https://www.another71.com/cpa-review-store/

Study Videos: https://www.another71.com/cpa-exam/cpa-exam-review-video/

[FL_CPA2010]

@ KSgirl86: If you are able to put in 8 hours a day of study time at work, then you should be fine. Especially since you're already a tax guru 🙂 I currently work in tax, and my biggest issue was the business law questions. I thought they were a lot more “grey” than the tax questions.

As far at the business law questions…just keep doing the MC over and over and over and over. I felt overwhelmed when I was going through the Becker questions, but the more I did them, the more it stuck. It will stick eventually if you keep doing them. I had to go through Becker's chapter 6 or 7 (I can't remember) about 5 times before I got it right. I had so many problems with negotiable instruments and the SEC.

I nailed the MC on my exam…I snaked by bc of my horrendous sims! If you know the concepts, you can ace the MC…then you just need to write something, anything, as long as it's, correct on the written comm to get enough points to get a 75. Now don't take that to mean that I am saying to blow up studying the sims…I say that to give you confidence that you can pass if you know the concepts and to keep redoing ALL the MCQ.

Good luck to all!

REG 79 (Becker); BEC 63 (Becker) 70 (Yaeger); AUD 66 (Becker; 11/30 - Becker); FAR 11/24 (Yaeger/Wiley)

[Anonymous]

Here's an easy (and almost always correct strategy)…

If you see a word that you haven't seen before as an answer choice, immediately get rid of it. I noticed with my studies that I often wasn't sure of the correct answer and there was sometimes and answer choice that I either hadn't heard of or didn't understand. When I'd guess that answer choice, I'd get the question wrong 99% of the time.

If you haven't encountered the answer choice before, it most likely is just there to mess with your head.

Also, try looking at the answer choices when you get stumped. There are usually at least three that are related (for example, subrogation, exoneration, and contribution are all ways that a surety can recover against the principal debtor). If those three answer choices showed up in a question asking about something unrelated to a surety or guarantor, you could immediately eliminate them and be left with only two possible choice. Try to group the answers when possible and eliminate anything that doesn't correspond to the topic. (I know that doesn't sound like very much help, but it was useful to me).

[suzzette1]

NJCPA2B thank you for the pointers that you have given to me. I am getting the nerves just reading about how brutal the Regulation exam.

BEC 2/8/10 - 75 (studied hard & prayed less)
REG 5/15/10 - 88 (studied less but prayed hard)
AUDITING 8/9/10 - 79 (studied hard and prayed hard)
FAR 11/30/10 - 79 (studied hard and prayed hard) Thanks GOD! I'm DONE

[Anonymous]

pls can anyone clarify if its true that tax forms in the sims r now out dated and they just have tabs to solve many problems… bcos ppl say there is no need to study sims or evn forms???

[Zaara]

I am just hoping at this point I pass REG as I didn't finish the last simulation and the communication tab was barely completed too.

[Anonymous]

pls can anybody help me with this question??? i don't remember what we are supposed to do on the exam day when sitting down in front of the computer for the test. do u need to put in any numbers?????. i hear that u must log in something within a short time limit or the computer test will shut u out? this is first test of reg and already dreaming about been very nervous .

[Anonymous]

You must bring your Notice to Sit paper and an ID (driver's license was always what I was asked for). Your NTS has the code to enter when you begin the exam. When you enter the Prometric Center, they'll ask you to write down the section code on your scratch paper.

[No2pencil]

Elsie — don't panic. Most of us have been through this. You shouldn't stress about this part. After your first exam you'll be a pro helping someone else.

To help answer part of your question above, after you (or the assistant at Prometric) enter the code to start the exam, you'll have ten minutes to start the first testlet. I read one post on this site last year where someone didn't start within ten minutes because they were writing memorized acronyms on their blank papers (to help them later in the exam). The person said they lost track of time and weren't able to sit for the exam. They had to reschedule (and I assume they had to pay another $200).

Good luck!

FAR 86, BEC 82, AUD 80, REG 83 Done, thank God - CA

[Anonymous]

allen thanks a lot for all yr replies.

i am getting very nervous for my reg exam, i feel its such a slippery slope especially for the sims and bss law which i am very weak in. its too late to postpone my exam due to nts scheduling etc…

i am also very weak in any tax form that is not 1040 and related….

pls does anyone know where i can get practice for the tax forms/sims problemstc..?????????????????????????????????

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

I just took REG today. All I can say is ouch. My head really hurt after!! The sims were so weird, same as everyone else mentioned, with lists of things to include in the written comm. that didn't really have much to do with what they were asking. I hope these sims were not the testing ones, because I want my score in the first wave!!!!! Multiple choice was tough too- not that they gave long, drawn-out problems. They just found really nit-picky questions to ask and also some questions were similar/related so if you didn't know how to do that sort of problem, you were wrong for both questions. My first testlet, the first half I was 100% confident about but I did end up having 2-3 for the first testlet that I just wasn't sure about and kept the tick marks (sometimes I check the tick mark but when I go back the answer is obvious so then I take away the mark-I'm not counting those questions in my 2-3 amount). My second and third testlets, I had about 5-7. So I'm hoping that means my testlets got harder, although I wasn't really able to tell. If you haven't taken REG yet, all I can say is make sure to pace yourself and leave time for the sims!!! I was really fortunate that I had read everyone's warnings here, and I had about an hour and 35 minutes for both. The timing was perfect- I had 5 minutes at the end of my 2nd sim (after reviewing it) so I just clicked done. Here were my approximate timings:

end of testlet one: 2 hrs and 1/2 left

end of testlet two: 2 hrs left

end of testlet three: 1 and 1/2 left

end of sim 1: 39 min left

end of sim 2: 5 min left

I suggest you don't take any bathroom/food breaks unless you are absolutely desperate. Timing for this one was much closer than by BEC where I took my time on each question, reviewed each section almost twice, and had 20 minutes extra.

While I know that I definitely without a doubt for sure got 4 questions wrong (came home and checked them!), I still think overall, it was okay. I'm just really annoyed that they could have tested on so much more but didn't. I feel like half of my studying was on info. not touched at all on the exam. I definitely should have left myself more time to review (only had about 2 1/2 days). Now the wait begins….

[Anonymous]

I was hoping someone with experience with the REG section could help me out. I just started to study for my 3rd section–REG. I always knew there would be a lot of memorization with this section, but am I really going to need to remember specifics such as all the tax rate schedules for each filing status? And the self employment tax is 12.4% of the first $106,800. I mean, 12.4% is pretty easy to remember. But the later part may not be so easy with all the other limits and what not. Can anyone offer me some advice on what is needed to memorize?

[Anonymous]

bakagal, where the bss law questions long and wordy and it appears u kept perfect timing for the testlets and sims. i was thinking i may need more than 30 mins for each of teastlet 2and 3 bcos of diffiulty. pls wwho has a great idea on good time to the sims 1 and 2. any ideas on how to research effectively?

[Anonymous]

so does anyone not think that the calculator provided is clumsy to use and definitely time consuming to help solve the problems??????????????? or am i the only one?????

[Anonymous]

elsie, I did not have that many business law questions, but what I did have were pretty simple and to the point. I wish I had had more! Most of the questions were not as wordy as Becker's. In terms of the annoying calculator, yes, it is really annoying. But, something I found helpful was to use it when doing ALL practice questions when studying..that way you become used to it by the time the exam comes around. That's what I've been doing and so I don't really notice anymore how annoying it is! Btw, you know, on the exam, just like in Becker, you can move the calculator around the screen, so that helps a bit.

I want to give a big shout out to AllenA who I feel helped me tons on the written comm. part!! He (assuming male) wrote a helpful post somewhere in this discussion about organization which helped me to no end. While the topics were crazy on my written comms., my memos actually sounded really good because of his tip of intro, body, conclusion. Sounds basic, but even though I'm a good writer, I had been having trouble during practice. So I suggest you read his post (somewhere around page 3 I think, all the pages keep changing). Thanks AllenA!!!!

[maksimum]

elsie

If you got lucky, you will be provided wit the regular calculator. At least they gave me one in the center a went to. May be they don't know the rules? I really don't care, but it is much better than the one provided in the testing program.

Took it last week. I think that MC – was reasonable. Hard. Some Q's extremely detailed… but more or less – within the scope of Becker.

The real problem are the SIMs. I would care less if they give me instructions on what should I write… as long as the topics are in the line with something I read. But in my case the memo I have to write was absolutely out of Becker's materials scope. I would not know what to right even if I have the books and notes available. Searching through IRC haven't helped either.

Good luck

[Author]

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