[MaLoTu]

There has been a lot of discussion on the sims. My personal kryptonite are the FAR sims. I feel they are WAY too vague and leave too much to the interpretation of the poor test taker. I don’t recall a single one of my FAR sims specifying the need for zeros or not and it is frustrating.

My theory is that if it doesn’t specify whether to put zeros or leave the space blank, you should put zeros. The reason why I feel this is true is because you do not get points deducted if the answer is wrong (and that is why I specify UNLESS it says to leave it blank). So, neither a blank nor a zero will increase your grade if there really is suppose to be an answer, but if the answer actually is zero then you would miss credit for leaving it blank.

I got a 70 on my last attempt at FAR. I left spaces blank instead of filling in zeros. I don’t know if it would have mattered, but I really wish that the AICPA would be more forthcoming with the specifics on the requirements of the sims. I personally think it is ridiculous that we do not, for certain, know the answer to this.

[choffner]

I put zeros when it was vague too. It's mind boggling that there are multiple options like this for SIMS, yet they don't tell you what they want.

Negative number? Enter as a positive, enter with a -, or use ()

No value? Use 0, or leave blank.

How about each SIM just states which is correct for that SIM?!? It has nothing to do with accounting knowledge or aptitude. It's gray area formatting.

BEC 75
REG 81
FAR 69, 75
AUD 71, 74, 84

[MaLoTu]

^ totally agree

[Biff-1955-Tannen]

I've been looking into old threads about this and still have no idea how to go about this. Some people put nothing and do fine, and some people put zeros and do fine.

For people that have recently passed FAR, can you tell us if you used 0's or left it blank? This is really stressing me out.

AUD 93 Jan 16
BEC 83 Feb 16
FAR 83 Apr 16
REG 84 May 16

99% Ninja MCQ only

[MaLoTu]

Biff – I didn't put zeros and got a 70. I just feel (as I explain above) that it doesn't hurt to put zeros if you have no other guidance because if it is wrong you don't lose points and the answer may actually be zero … which means if you leave it blank, it is losing points because you did not get the points for putting zero … does that make sense, it felt funky writing it?!

[monikernc]

i don't recall not getting a specific instruction. i do recall on AUD a vague warning rather than specifics but i got a sense of what it wanted me to do. i know biff can't do the practice exam but what about tutorial or other info on AICPA site?

FAR 7/25/15 76!
AUD 10/30/15 93
BEC 2/27/16 82
REG 5/23/16 88!
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[wanttochangejobbypassingcpa]

Hi I see that you actually pass FAR with high score. So did you actually put zero in J/E?

[Hurricane]

I didn't leave blacks in any of the exams. I always entered zero.

AUD - 96
BEC - 88
FAR - 88
REG - TBS

[Author]

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