ACCA F5 – Performance Management is all about costing. Advanced from ACCA F2, F5 is concerned with managing business so as to achieve overall better performance. It is tested here in more detail than F2.
　　It comprises of 5 different portions which are
　　Management Accounting Techniques
　　Decision Making Techniques
　　Budgeting
　　Variances
　　Performance Measurement
　　As ACCA have included MCQ’s into fundamental series so every syllabus area is equally important and MCQ’s can come from any area of syllabus so you should have sound knowledge of every area of ACCA F5
　　Management Accounting Techniques is comparatively an easy topic and covers Activity Based costing (ABC), Life cycle costing, Throughput accounting, Target costing and Environment costing. ABC, Throughput and Target focuses both on calculations and analysis while Life cycle and Environment Costing are theory based. It may become part of MCQ’s or alone 10 marks question or with some other topic.
　　Decision Making Techniques is a bit tricky topic in the area and involves Relevant cost, Cost volume, Limiting factor analysis, Pricing decisions, make or buy decisions and dealing with risk and uncertainty. This is tested in detail and you have to do both calculations and analysis. This area is tested in 15 marks questions sole or with some other topic.
　　Budgeting is all about how to prepare and forecast budgets. It is easy area of topic and covers Budgetary systems, Types of budgets, Quantitative analysis in budgeting. It may be tested in 15 marks question sole or with some other topic.
　　Variances is quite easy for anyone who can understand it and will be difficult if they couldn’t. Mix and yield, Planning and operational and Sale variances are now the topics together with performance analysis and behavioral aspects which will be tested in 10 marks question sole or with some other topic.
　　Performance measurement is also an important area as well and may be tested in 10 marks question or become part of other questions too. It includes Ratios, Divisional performance, Transfer pricing and Information systems.
　　ACCA F6 is Taxation Paper and it provides core concept of taxation which is further utilized in ACCA P6 Exam. Syllabus gives you basic knowledge about Corporate and Individual Tax calculations. Other areas include CGT, VAT and InHeritance Tax which also came across with questions and individually.Exam technique recommended by most tutors is that you should read your book and then practice as many questions as you can. Mostly F6 has formats which needs to be reminded in questions. The more you practice these formats, the more grip you will get over them.Question#1 Individual Tax Calculations require you to learn about Employment, Property, NIC, Pensions etc which are combined to make Questions #1 with sometimes VAT inclusion.
　　Question #2 is about Corporate Tax Calculations and also require you to learn about companies tax calculations. It sometimes have VAT or CGT or IHT within it.
　　Question #3 is on CGT require you to learn about capital gains tax.
　　Question #4 and 5 can be from any syllabus areas. Usually these have IHT and VAT with some portion from Income or Corporate tax calculations.
　　With introduction of MCQ’s after December 14 session, We hope that paper will become tough as you cannot skip anything. You have to learn everything and core concepts must be understood to give answers of MCQ’s and MTQ’s.
　　Key to success of this paper is Practice and Practice. So practice as much as you can with ACCA F6 Exam Kit.