58 still means the LOWEST pass rate the exam has had. Why should ~18% more people pass last sitting than this? They removed the word count just 2 days before, no marks for graph... The paper itself was so much harder than normal considering the sensitivity required as well. This is not going to be a realistic communication for an actuary.Definitely agreed. It felt like such unnecessary extra stress! It'll be interesting how they cover it in the examiners report.
Maybe the mitigating circumstance reviewers were thinking along similar lines about the lack of time pressure, and hence why i didn't get my extra two marks. Or maybe just because it would be unfair on anyone that didn't submit a mitigating circumstances form. Ah well. Fingers crossed for April.
58 still means the LOWEST pass rate the exam has had. Why should ~18% more people pass last sitting than this? They removed the word count just 2 days before, no marks for graph... The paper itself was so much harder than normal considering the sensitivity required as well. This is not going to be a realistic communication for an actuary.
58 still means the LOWEST pass rate the exam has had. Why should ~18% more people pass last sitting than this? They removed the word count just 2 days before, no marks for graph... The paper itself was so much harder than normal considering the sensitivity required as well. This is not going to be a realistic communication for an actuary.
This is not going to be a realistic communication for an actuary.
58 still means the LOWEST pass rate the exam has had. Why should ~18% more people pass last sitting than this? They removed the word count just 2 days before, no marks for graph... The paper itself was so much harder than normal considering the sensitivity required as well. This is not going to be a realistic communication for an actuary.
58 still means the LOWEST pass rate the exam has had. Why should ~18% more people pass last sitting than this?
That was the first sitting (with very little past papers), that explains the lower pass rate - the exam itself was actually quite easy to get over 70 in. The institute changed these exams so you could only sit them twice a year to encourage people to try harder... well now people are waiting to qualify on a nothing exam. This exam should consistently have a pass rate over 60%, like a CT/CP2.Perhaps it was the April 2018 sitting that was the anomaly? The pass rate for this exam was very close to the pass rate for the previous September sitting.
I agree about the weird choice of topic of communication. I hadn't done any past papers where the recipient has to be assumed to have no financial knowledge whatsoever - it's normally trustees, or accountants, or some other department in a financial company. I wouldn't be surprised if next time it was a more conventional situation.
Looking at the examiners report - many marks are given for detailing the calculation to the customer, giving the rates to go with them! Do I now suddenly live in a world where intellectual property doesn't exist? I have never seen an insurer detail what loading every rating factor gets to a customer - you would get sacked. Bizarre. Unless that's what happens in life insurance?
If they wanted us to ignore giving away intellectual property for the purpose of communication testing, they could have stated that in the paper. It seems wrong for actuaries to give out an insurer's IP, I assumed that was a trick the exam was trying to trap you into.I thought the CA3/CP3 exam was meant to be an application exam, to test one's communication in a situation an actuary would likely find himself/herself in, or words to that effect- read the syllabus & guide to this subject. If this exam question was not doing that then it's not fit for purpose and may be a breach of contract on the part of IFoA.
If they wanted us to ignore giving away intellectual property for the purpose of communication testing, they could have stated that in the paper. It seems wrong for actuaries to give out an insurer's IP, I assumed that was a trick the exam was trying to trap you into.
Can someone from Acted please comment on their thoughts given all of the things discussed on this thread?
I filled in a mitigating circumstances form because I thought I'd give it a try given that some people got the paper emailed whereas I never did. Just heard back and the panel decided not to change my mark. I was only two marks off so its a shame that the panel didn't think that losing over 15 mins could have impacted my results...
Anyway, maybe this can comfort anyone that didn't fill in a mitigating circumstances form - you aren't missing out on any extra marks.
I'd be interested to hear anyone else's experience. It also seems strange to change the pass mark for everyone when some people were emailed the paper and some were not.
With regard to the September 2018 CP3 exam, I’m afraid it’s not ActEd’s role to comment on the suitability of any particular exam, or on issues with exam administration.
However, it is ActEd’s role to help students maximise their chances of success when preparing for IFoA exams. Part of exam preparation is analysis of past examinations. So, looking at the September 2018 CP3 exam, it is clear that candidates sitting this exam would have been faced with a choice of either explaining the full premium basis, or explaining the difference between the price comparison site quote and the actual premium amount. If a candidate decided that it was not appropriate to explain the full basis, then the alternative approach of explaining the increase would be chosen. The marking schedule (published within in the Examiners' Report) allows candidates to take either of these two possible routes and score fully – specifically the [9] section in the marking schedule credits the approach of explaining the increase. In this way the examiners have accommodated the fact that the objectives in communicating might be achieved in different ways and have designed the marking schedule accordingly.
We are currently working on our ASET for CP3, and hope that it will be available early in 2019. It will cover all the past CP3 exams along with the Specimen exam.
"Jargon and terminology"
I scored 4/8/4 out of 12 here.
Jargon [4]
I used the term "Age next birthday" because in context it sounded better than "How old you will be on your next birthday".
I used no other terms in the lists (other than BMI which I explained)
I would suggest that you could have just used "age" here - the definition of what age you are using is a technical point and really doesn't matter to the customer so can be written more concisely.