[waffle_house]

I read all the time that AUD is considered one of the “easiest” of the four exams. However, the AICPA pass rates show the AUD exam as being the lowest. What is the reasoning behind this? Is it because people tend to believe work experience is sufficient to not study? Or is this test really that tricky?

Can someone enlighten me on their experience.

AUD - 80
BEC - 75
FAR - 84
REG - 76

Exams started Sep 2014 -Exams done Mar 2017

Texas CPA

I put in work, it was evident

[taxman89]

because it sucks and is the illegitimate love child of the devil 😀

AUD - 75
BEC - 77
FAR - 78
REG - 82

AUD: 61-67-75 (Thanks ninja aud)
BEC: 77
FAR: 78
REG:69-73-70-82

Aud-75 3x I knew i never liked you
Bec-77 1x being in the bubble is stressful
Reg-82 4x its not me its you...and no we cant be friends
Far-78 1x easiest section

[the LAST Coffee]

Test takers look over short questions too quickly.

FAR is considered the hardest so test takers study for this one heavily and as a consequence, the passing rate goes up.

BEC is easiest in terms of passing rate considering the way it is formatted (85% is MCQs).

FAR 84 (AUG '15)
BEC 83 (AUG '15)
AUD 79 (OCT '15)
REG 71, 78! (NOV '15, FEB '16)

[Gatorbates]

Because there are no numbers. You either know the answer or you don't. If you study enough and understand it, you should have absolutely no problem. A lot of people say, “Hey it's the easiest”, then don't study as hard, think they can pass if they wing it, and end up crash and burning.

Licensed Florida CPA:
B: 71, 73, 79
A: 83
R: 78 (expired), 77
F: 74, 74, 80

It's finally freaking over.

[OlintoJr]

I've seen people say it is because lots of foreign people struggle with it due to ilthe questions being a bit wordier/ less number oriented. Not sure if there is much truth to that though.

My experience: felt super prepared going in, thought I failed after taking it, ended up with an 86.

FAR - 11/30/14 -79
AUD - 2/19/15 -86
BEC - 4/09/15 -86
REG - 11/30/15 -87

I'M DONE! ITS OVER! WOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

[wombataholic]

I agree with OlintoJr about the wordiness of the questions. Slight changes to the wording of questions can/will change the correct answer, and as Last Coffee said, test takers don't read over the questions carefully.

It's harder to do that with numbers (though not impossible), hence the higher pass rate for FAR, even though it is, by consensus, more difficult to prepare for.

AUD - 91
BEC - 85
FAR - 91
REG - 92

CPA, CFE
Passed all 4 CPA exam sections with Ninja Notes/MCQ/Audio

Licensed CPA
Passed each section on the first try with Ninja Notes/MCQ/Audio

[Anonymous]

I thought I was doing reasonably well when I took it (esp. the SIMs), but I barely passed (gratefully!).

[monikernc]

the only thing i remember about taking the mcq portion of that exam is gripping my left arm during the 3rd testlet and thinking i may need to ask them to call an ambulance. i kept holding my breath while reading the q&a's. once i paid attention to my breathing i was fine but with few exceptions can't remember any of the questions. the prometric staff did make a comment about how hard i seemed to be concentrating whenever they walked through. i expected to fail badly. but as you see below, they must have given me someone else's score :). the audit exam freaked me out from the moment it started. luckily, i really was prepared.

AUD - 93
BEC - 82
FAR - 76
REG - 88

How have you been?
Ninja book and MCQs and the forum, all first try! 2016
Licensed State of Montana April Fool’s Day 2020
State of Colorado June 2020 - AICPA Ethics 93
Experience was the worst part of the journey for me. You?
If you want things to change you have to do something different.

FAR 7/25/15 76!
AUD 10/30/15 93
BEC 2/27/16 82
REG 5/23/16 88!
Ninja Book and MCQ and the forum - all the way!!!
and a little thing i like to call, time and effort!
if you want things to change, you have to do something different

[thedude]

@taxman89

Thanks for the laugh dude.

Aud: 42 (ouch)

All others TBD

[Anonymous]

I think it's because people underestimate it and think it would be common sense kind of exam, which I am accused of doing as well. Moreover, people with audit experience go to exam without studying or little studying only, which I saw with many many people.

Also, I don't think foreigners have a hard time with audit due to the wording because this is not a language exam. It's pretty basic and exam uses same language/tone as Becker. I am a foreigner to English and I found FAR to be tricky in that regard.

I felt good after the exam, but I cannot guarantee passing because I really didn't study. If I fail, I'll be pissed and won't do it until next summer.

[Skynet]

Illuminati

AUD - 90
BEC - 78
FAR - 84
REG - 87

World Domination Plan

Phase I : Pass CPA Exams - Complete
Phase II : Megan Fox - In Progress
Phase III : Megan Fox & Scarlett Johansson Lingerie Pillow Fight
Phase IV : Form the new Charlie's Angels with Megan Fox, Scarlett Johansson, & Gal Gadot
Phase V : TBD

BEC : 78
REG : 87
FAR : 84
AUD : 90

World Domination Plan

Phase I : Pass CPA Exams - Complete
Phase II : Megan Fox - Initiated
Phase III : Bring back 8-Tracks
Phase IV : Megan Fox & Scarlett Johansson Lingerie Pillow Fight
Phase V : TBA

[Mark]

Hard to argue against illuminati Agree with most but mostly with gator. You have to know the material and if you do, the questions and tricks are easier to spot. But you can't work the numbers to get thru it. You either know the facts or you don't.

Like every section, you have to immerse yourself in the material like its part of skynet's world domination plan.

FAR - 11/11/2014 - 80
BEC - 02/05/2015 - 88
AUD - 04/2015 - 89
REG - 05/2015 89
Active NJ CPA 09/09/2015

[CPAlife04]

The questions are tricky and one word changes the entire answer, such as “nonissuers”.

Audit: 11/28/15 (72) April 2016
Regulation: 2016
Financial: 2016
Business: 2016
NINJA

"The CPA exam is not a test of my ability, it is a test of my will. I have the will!"

[win2bet]

i hate studying audit with a passion. imo it does a poor job at testing the knowledge & just wants to trick you & too many questions have more than 1 right answer; its basically which one is “more right”

i don't think the other sections were as subjective as this one is. i.e. a question on AUD is “Before accepting an engagement to audit a new client, a CPA is required to obtain” & the answer is -“the prospective client's consent to make inquiries of the predecessor auditor, if any”

meanwhile the explanation to the answer is “AU-C 210 requires that an auditor attempt to obtain client permission…” notice the question doesn't include the word attempt. a test so fixated on one words like required, should, may, etc, should do a better job than this

,

REG 68,87
BEC 85
FAR 75
AUD 64,64, 86!

[Anonymous]

I hate Aud, I studied for it the least and it was my highest score. Aud was my last exam and I had to fit it in the window, but luckily I was getting better at studying. Honestly, knowing how to study and being honest about your own weaknesses is a big part of this game.

There is very little to study with Aud, but the test makers seem like they want to make it difficult because of the fraud that goes on in the profession. This is why I think they play every word game imaginable on this test. I disagree with this test being about how well you know the topic. I know jack $h^t about auditing compared to some that scored much worse than I did. I have always been a decent test taker and thought Audit really was intentionally tricky and favored test taking skill over content knowledge (way more than FAR or REG which I thought were straightforward but with much more difficult content) .

I do believe non native speakers will struggle with this exam more than others, I agree with that. But I think another huge issue is the authoritative literature. If you know how to reference that well, it really helps on the sims. If you don't reference it, you're making things more difficult for yourself.

[thederek]

I have an eternal hate for this section. Its what I do to pay the bills, and I spent just as.much time on this section as FAR. I even got to the point where I was bored with both the MCQs and SIMs in the gleim test bank. Go to the test and almost NONE of them I was able to narrow down to less than two answers. And the amount of detail.. My god. I had about three or four questions that I didn't even remember being covered in the book. And when I got home… Its because they weren't! I found the actual AU-C and ET verbage and apparently guessed right on the ones I remembered… I swear if I fail I'm going to binge drink for a week. Because I really can't tell how it went… Or what I could change, short of studying the actual rules themselves.

BEC - 10/05/15 - 83
FAR - 11/09/15 - 79
AUD - 11/30/15 - 84
REG - 02/14/16 - 82

[Author]

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