All I can say is: Too long! my hand now hurts and I give up. I'm never going to pass this exam. Maybe a change of career would be good.......
I agree it seemed long. I left myself only about 45 mins to tackle Q3 (35 marks) so I rushed the end of it and missed a few "gimme" marks in the process I think...
Yep - definitely too long. I didn't want to get distracted by 2 so tackled this last - not sure it did me any good though! The examiners can ask up to 4 questions and have gradually moved from 2 to 3 over the last few years. I'm not sure that they make any allowance for switching your thoughts from one scenario to another though. I hope I pass it before we get to 4...
I'll be yet another one to agee with the "too long" comments. This was really really time pressured. I missed out the last part of Q1 (admittedly only 7 marks) and had to rattle through Q2 which I left till last - so didnt have any time to see afterwards of my calcs looked right or not! I was fairly pleased that I worked out what the processing centre's error was - despite only looking at the numbers for about 20 seconds - possibly just a fluke! I felt the paper was actually quite fair content-wise (albeit perhaps too much on bulk transfers? I did repeat myself a bit between Q1 and Q3), just really really time presssured.
Also thought a bit strange that Q1 and Q3 both transfer related. what was the processing centre's problem? Not sure about the length. I've had similar time issues with other exams. I don't think more time would have got me many more marks - perhaps one or two from the calcs in question 2 (hence my Q above!)
I think the people in Barbados/ LA/ Other sunnier places will probably be past the point of no return now.... Re: Yet Another Student- my check tied in better when I stripped out the Salary increase change for actives. So I put that down as my potential error (but equally, my switches could have been wrong). I made the mistake of doing this first cos I didn't want to panic at the last minute with calcs- but I don't think this helped the time thing D'Oh. Also agree that the exam seemed heavy on the whole transfers and M+A/ disposals side of things. So kicking myself that I didn't mention s75 debt issues or the possible need to revisit investment strategy post transfer, or even conflicts!(oops) Hate exams that you have to do quickly! Why can't we do SA4 coursework so that we get the chance to think straight! Ah well I've been drowning my sorrows in Irn Bru and, actually, Peroni.
Hi All, I ditto the issue about time - I only managed to answer 80% of paper, but think had a good stab. Q2 was strange - the error I think was in active member calc - and there could be a number of reasons - wrong basis used, average age of deferreds used, 2007 figures instead of 2008 used as starting point etc... I didnt understand part 1 of Q3 - how you would handle accrued liabs - the sale and purchase agreement states the method and timing of accrued liabs - so I listed different ways of calculating liabs and when they can be paid i.e at start of pp, end of pp, date of transfer. Not sure but couldnt think of anything else!! Finally Q1 - praqtical issues iro ETV - apart of actually calc TVS, getting data, communication to members (and what to include), admin issues I couldnt think of other things - possibly obtain legal advice! Comments PS what is the pass mark for this?
I hate sa4 Also think the paper was too long, I was getting very annoyed that the paper seemed primarily focused on Company and not Trustee advice - did anyone else think this? The first question was soley the Finance Director (if I remember correctly), only 2 parts of q3 referred to the Trustees. I did not understand what the last part of q3 was asking at all.
I did my usual exam thing and panicked. I agree that question 3 was weirdly worded, particularly part 1. I made a good stab at question 1 but fell apart by the time I got to question 3. Never mind - I drowned my sorrows last night and could really do with some Irn Bru for my hangover!!
Hi All, Can some1 please confirm whether their checks in Q2 part 1 (11 marks) came out close to what the valuation centre results- I managed to get both results 9using approximate techniques) to be within 1.5% of results given - but seems too good to be true!!!!!!!
The AA - my checks were close in part one (a, anyway). as for the accrued liabs in Q3 I answered the 'leave behind, move to new er, offer transfer, buyout' version of the question but I think yours might also be correct... dunno what they wanted. Your answer assumes they've already decided to transfer to new er, but maybe that's what the question wanted to say (but didn't). Diane - yes, I did notice that both Q1 and Q3 you were the 'actuarial advisor' rather than scheme actuary. And completely with you on the last part of Q3!! IrnBru - so the peroni comes first, then the irn bru? beer myself
......I recently moved to working in Life and thought I'd have another crack at this as the studying was done...but looks like I'll have to bite the bullet now and sit SA2.... dont think the paper was difficult it just seemed unfair in relation to the Core Reading....perhaps I'm misguided but I spent alot of time on the newer sections in the notes e.g. 00 series tables, ASB....plus learning piles of lists....complete waste of time for this paper....I feel I could have sat that exam w/out looking at the notes at all I started the exam by trying to constantly remind myself not to muck up on the time....30mins in and I'd already hit the panic button and the rest was just a blur.... and yes how badly worded was part 1 of Q3....I think I shouted out "WHHHAAAT!?" in the exam hall.....there also seemed to be little snippets of info you'd expect to see missing throughout all the Qs..probably deliberate to try through you off track - if so they succeeded with me! very hungover today
Yetanotherstudent: I guess if you allow for the member movements over the year and rollforward the 2007 figures, the answer is likely to be approximatley close to actual results. i guess if you did not allow for member movements then the figures would be way out. When i allowed for member movements (in an approximate manner i.e ratio of change in pen sal, ratio of accrued pension at dol etc...) I ogt figures approximately 2% higher then actual figures. maybe it depends how you allowed for the movements.
Ambiguity? I was exactly the same - I was determined not to let myself get pushed for time but after only answering Part 1 of Question 1, I was already ten minutes behind! Then the panic started! I wasn't really sure what I was supposed to do with the member movement thing in Question 2 - it just seemed like a rather strange question. I also looked at Part 1 of Question 3 and went "WHAT?" - I hadn't got a clue what they were looking for. I think I mentioned not transferring, transferring and getting similar benefits, transferring and getting completely different benefits etc. The question was very ambiguous, or was that just me? That's the third time I've sat it now and it's starting to annoy me - I didn't struggle with any of the other exams but now I'm being overtaken by people who just seem to find SA4 easy! Where am I going wrong????? I know the course like the back of my hand - I just find myself not understanding what the examiners are trying to ask. I'm not sure how I can work on that though - Any suggestions?
fraggle, I think with this particular exam (first sitting for me) the 'not understanding what the examiners are trying to ask' is going to be a common problem.....! I think the only way past this one is to sit it till you get lucky. other posts have mentioned cases where in one past paper the answer is X, and in another where the practically identical question has been asked the answer has been Y (Y<>X for the sake of clarity here!).... I reckon I probably didn't allow for member movements correctly then - sigh. Ah well. Time to stop worrying and enjoy just over 2 months of NOT studying before getting back to the books - although I have to agree with inthebag that more studying (of the notes, at least) would not have helped me in the slightest with this exam!!!!
I agree, much too long. My calcs going backwards were off by about (a) 5%. Going forwards were pretty damn close. For 3 marks I didn't really care why so I blamed the dog. Too much M&A for my liking. I can see the headlines in the report... "candidates were unable to draw from a broad range of answers and repeated themselves and repeated themselves." pffft Bring on the summer anyway!
question 3 - very unclear wording I felt the wordings of the whole question 3 were so unclear that I wasn't quite sure what the examiners are looking for. The question was broken down into a few parts, each with 5-6 marks which looks manageable, but then I found myself writting very similar thing under each part which is very worrying, I'm sure the examiners are looking for different points under these but it's just so unclear what they are after! Is it just me or do you find the question very badly worded too?
I realised I didn't know exactly what the examiners were after for question 3 and that made me start to panic! I'm glad I wasn't the only one! Never mind eh? It looks like I'll be sitting it in September.
Hmm... ...I presumed part 1 of Q3 to mean ways of calculating the transfer amount itself. I.e. share of fund (on ongoing or buyout), sum of individual TVs, sum of past service reserves, etc... ...the moment I walked out I did think maybe it was meant to be more like beginning of / end of participation period instead. It's anyone's guess really. I think they both seem sensible approaches...as are porbably several others. Question was extremely wooley-ly (not a real word!) worded! There was a 3 marker in there somewhere about "risks relating to pensions in the company buying another company with a pension scheme" (who, of course, were in deficit. I had to stop myself writing about 10 marks of material here...and running even more out of time. But its impossible (I thought) to know which 3 marks worth they were looking for! As for Q2 - I didnt account for member movements at all! I didnt think you were supposed to - because the scheme was open so you didnt need to "roll forward" as such, but just use a different term to retirement, set of assumptions and salary roll / deferred pension roll. Which made the maths easier! But maybe I misunderstood this - I can see how rolling forward allowing for member movements should also work equally well. Though would take longer... ...my attempt for the processing centre's error was they used the 07 salary increase assumption instead of the 08 one (for the 08 valn). All the other figures tied up fairly nicely. And if you bunged in the 07 salary inc assumption "by mistake" you got their answer almost bang on! Again, though, I think you could argue a number of errors could have been possible. And as for whoever it was who said oops they missed off mentioning S75 debt issues, review of investment strategy etc. So did I. oops. I was a little worried I also mentioned GN16 (in reasonable detail) in both Q1 and Q3. Which seemed unlikely to be what they were after. Though it seemed to fit in both. Anyone find anything relevant to say about the fact that in Q3 it was a management buyout as opposed to a standard M&A? Its the kind of thing you are clearly meant to pick up on...but I couldnt see any way to actually do so. This was only intended to be a short post. So I'm going to stop now (pent up emotion I think!!!) G
