Top 5 factors to know for AUD exam?

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  • #165921
    ppierce
    Participant

    Hit me with what you think are the 5 most important things to know/be familiar with for the AUD test.

    Have 3 weeks left till test and want to hit those the hardest.

    FAR 80
    REG 76
    AUD 85
    BEC 85
    Ethics 98
    DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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  • #322636
    Tebowwwww
    Member

    Before I say anything take this with a grain of salt – there are a lot more than 5 topics you need to know to pass, and these are only my opinion.

    1) The different audit opinions and the situations that would cause you to pick one over another (GAAP vs GAAS, what falls under unqualified and what doesn't, etc)

    2) The other services – attest, compilation, review, etc. Know what they are and what the requirements for independence, disclosure, and limited reporting are

    3) The audit assertions used for account balances, transactions, and disclosures. If you know enough about accounting you can figure out enough on transaction cycles to get by, but you need to remember these.

    4) The 10 GAAS standards and concepts like independence/ethics and the relevant general rules.

    5) Audit Sampling. It's not a huge section on the exam but most people don't know much at all about it and need extra time to study. If you get a SIM or more than a couple questions on this topic knowing it can be the difference between passing and failing.

    REG (7/7/11) 75
    FAR (7/28/11) 76
    BEC (8/27/11) 81
    AUD (10/15/11, 1/20/12) 63, 91

    DONE!!!

    #322637
    gateway3601
    Participant

    @ Tebowwwwww

    Hi, How did you improve your audit score by 28 points? What did you do differently? I've failed audit 3 times now and every time I am always stronger on the multiple choice questions and bombed the sims. Any suggestions on how to improve my scores will be greatly appreciated?

    FAR(61,73,73,74,76) REG-81 AUD(61,64,58) BEC(71,77)

    #322638
    Tebowwwww
    Member

    @Gateway the honest answer is that I took it the first time and didn't study nearly enough. Had I put the time into it that I put into REG and FAR I probably could have passed the first time. I'm also a big 4 auditor and a lot of the concepts are easier to understand when you have real-world experience in auditing to help you through.

    When I study (used Becker) I'd always hand-write a set of notes instead of just highlighting/circling/whatever in the book, both because I remember stuff a lot better when I write it down myself and because it's a lot nicer to have a condensed 10 page review guide as opposed to 80+ pages in the textbook. Then I go through the Multiple Choice questions over and over again until I know I have all the concepts down.

    In my opinion there really isn't a good way to study specifically for the SIMS, so I just learn the material as best I can and apply what I know from MC's to any tasks I get. I also made sure I had a lot of time for the SIMS and used the Authoritative Literature as much as possible to check my answers – I think I got an entire simulation right by just looking up each question in the literature. But you need to make sure you have an hour and 40 minutes or so on the SIMS to be able to do that, which is where practicing the MC's helps because I can get through them a bit quicker and leave more time at the end.

    Other than getting a job as an Auditor I'd say your best bet is to try writing all the notes down yourself as opposed to just following the lectures. It helped me really understand the concepts as opposed to just remembering how to answer the review questions.

    REG (7/7/11) 75
    FAR (7/28/11) 76
    BEC (8/27/11) 81
    AUD (10/15/11, 1/20/12) 63, 91

    DONE!!!

    #322639
    gateway3601
    Participant

    Thank you. I will follow your method.

    FAR(61,73,73,74,76) REG-81 AUD(61,64,58) BEC(71,77)

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