OBU BSC (HONS.) IN APPLIED ACCOUNTING TIPS & GUIDANCE ACCAReloaded 2,235 Comments Dear Members!

! It is an important introduction how to make your RAP and what OBU requires you t o complete. It s better to read all the information provided below in order to get Pass. 01. You must be eligible to take the OBU confirm your status at MyACCA(portal.ac caglobal.com) a) You must be registered with Oxford Brookes University i.e. opted-in to the BS c degree scheme before passing any of the three ACCA Fundamentals papers, F7, F8 and F9. b) Pass the three ACCA Fundamentals papers F7, F8 and F9 and pass other papers a s required to successfully complete all nine Fundamentals level papers c) The degree must be completed within 10 years of your start date onto the ACCA ?s professional qualification otherwise your eligibility will be withdrawn. d) If you have a status of you have not indicated whether you want to opt in or n ot then you can simply mail to acca@brookes.ac.uk to opt you in. 02. The Professional And Ethics Module must be completed before submitting the R AP. (Dates can be found in the latest BSC Info Pack.) 03. Your all dues must be cleared with ACCA before submission of RAP. 04. There are Nine Areas which all you have to pass in order to achieve the degr ee. a) Seven are of the Research Report : 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Understanding of accountancy / business models Application of accountancy / business models Evaluation of information, analysis and conclusions Presentation of project findings Communication Information gathering and referencing Information technology

b) And two are of Skills and Learning Statement. 1. Self Reflection 2. Communication Skills (Including presentation) 05. There should be 5 separate files: a) Research Report. b) Skills and Learning Statement. c) List of References. d) Power Point Presentation. e) Appendices (first appendix for financial statements only, notes to the accounts should not be included. If necessary, then you can include them in the List of References file & a second appendix only for the Ratios

Calculations should be made.) 06. There should be a Title Page of your each file mentioning file name , words count e.g. (Research Report, 6500 Words) your name, ACCA number (ABCD GHI, 1234567) also company name & its Financial Year End, topic name and topic number. E.g. An eval uation of the business and financial performance of XYZ Co between 1 January 2010 and 31 D ecember 2012 (Topic 8). 07. If you are preparing RAP on Topic-8 make sure you must use up to date & Audi ted Financial Statements. Even the company s year end should be same (Jan to Dec or July to June ) and company must have an industrial competitor for the comparison with same year end . 08. For the purpose of Financial Analysis of research report on topic ld calculate: a) b) c) d) e) Financial Analysis (G. P. Margin & N. P. Margin). Short term Solvency Analysis (Current Ratio & Quick Ratio). Long term Solvency Analysis (Interest Cover). Shareholder`s Investment Anaylsis (EPS, DPS & Dividend Payout Ratio). These ratios are enough for the analysis. 8 you shou

09. For the purpose of Business Analysis on topic 8 you should incorporate two b usiness models: a) SWOT should be included no matter if you don t even want to. b) PESTEL or FIVE FORCES can be the second one. 10. Structure, word count and presentation of RAP Words are limited to 6500 Words. Your research report should be in the format gi ven below: 1) TITLE PAGE 2) CONTENTS PAGE 3) PART 1 Project objectives and overall research approach 1,000 words

a) The first part of your Research Report sets the scene following: i) Selection of Topic. ii) Reason for selecting topic 8. iii) Selection of Organization. iv) Reason of selection of Organization. v) Your project objectives. vi) Research questions. vii) An explanation of your overall research approach. PART 2

It should include the

Information gathering and accounting / business techniques

1,500 words

a) The second part of your Research Report should provide more detail about the information that you have gathered and the accounting and business techniques yo u

have chosen to apply to this information. It should include the following: i) The sources of information from which you have obtained relevant data, a description of the methods used to collect information, including online access ii) A discussion of the limitations of your information gathering iii) Identification of any ethical issues that arose during your information gat hering and how they were resolved. iv) An explanation of the accounting and / or business techniques you have used, including a discussion of their limitations. PART 3 Results, analysis, conclusions and recommendations 4,000 words

a) The third part of your Research Report should provide a detailed account of w hat you have found from the application of your chosen accounting and business techniques to the information that you have gathered. It should include: i) A description of the results you have obtained and any limitations ii) Presentation of your results in an appropriate form e.g. tables, graphs, pie charts within the research report. iii) A critical analysis / evaluation of your results, which includes an explana tion of your significant findings and your conclusions about your research findings and how well you have met your project objectives and research questions If appropriate, recommendations on specific courses of action to identify individuals within your chosen organisation. 11. In Skills and Learning Statement Only these Four Questions should be answere d: a) Reflect on what you have learnt from the meetings with your project mentor, including the presentation that you gave to your project mentor? b) To what extent do you think you have achieved the RAP research objectives you set? c) How have you demonstrated your interpersonal and communication skills during the project work? d) Reflect on how undertaking the RAP helped you in your accountancy studies and /or current employment role? 12. Word count and appendices : a) You must stay within the specified maximum word count. Oxford Brookes Univers ity reserves the right to fail Research Reports which contain more than the maximum 6,500 words. & 2000 words for SLS. It is not compulsory you answer 4 questions with 500 words each but an overall total of SLS should be 2000 words. You will b e asked to declare your word count of your project on the Oxford Brookes Universit y RAP registration form. b) The 6,500 & 2000 word limit excludes the Title Page, the Contents Page, the L ist of References, the Appendices Words used in tables and graphs and other forms of da ta presentation are not included in the word count, however tables that include wri

tten analysis (for example a SWOT analysis table) and words used in section headings are included in the word count such as Four questions of SLS. c) Word counts exclude: title page, contents table, equations, diagrams, referen ce list, bibliography and appendices, but include: headings, tables and in-text citations . d) You should use appendices only for supporting data and information. You shoul d not include written text that properly belongs in the main body of your Research Rep ort. e) You should keep the number of appendices as low as possible and no more than 8 sides excluding any extracts from financial statements. 13. Penalties for exceeding the word limit: a) The recommended rule is that only the parts of the submission within the word limit will be marked, and the rest will be ignored. 14. Make sure you have included a Reference List and cited it within the project correctly. (http://www.brookes.ac.uk/library/resources/harvard.doc) 15. Power Point & Overall Presentation: a) Make sure you give a corporate standard PowerPoint presentation by just highlighting the key areas of your RAP. The text used in the presentation should be easily visible while presenting an actual presentation. b) Use A4 Size Pages, with Normal Margins, Black Text, only white background, no italics or heavy bold type. c) Arial/Cambria /Times New Roman or any other business font can be used with a font size of 11 or 12, a larger font size for headings. And line spacing of 1.5 only. d) You can use any version of MS OFFICE. Furthermore, It is not necessary you pr ovide Financial Statements in MS Excel, you can provide them in MS Word also. 16. There is a vital role of Project mentor there is no need to mention his name but you have to refer 3 meetings with the mentor in SLS within the Four Questions. If you are pr eparing RAP by yourself then you should also refer a mentor in your RAP in order to fulf il the requirement because you have to mention your mentor Name, Designation /Relations hip, Company and his Email ID. A mentor can be anyone but should have an Email Id bec ause few of the confirmations are sent to the mentors. If your mentor does not respon d to that query then your project will not be passed. 17. At the end of the project you should use a spelling and grammar checker e.g. Ginger It! (http://www.mediafire.com/?7s0jpkhtn030jki), It can also help you to highlight y our spelling & grammatical mistakes and can help you to reduce your word count. But

be careful to ensure that you do not unintentionally change the meaning of your tex t. 18. What ever you refer you wrote in your RAP if it is copied from some other so urce or by someone already available on the internet then you should refer in your RAP. Fai lure to do so will lead to a disciplinary action against you resulting failure of RAP and t he cancellation of ACCA & monetary penalties. 19. After preparation & submission of RAP. Make sure you do not share your RAP w ith any, failure to do so will lead to disciplinary actions.