How To Study CA Intermediate Audit Part 1

I see most of the students struggling to clear or score decent marks in the CA Intermediate Audit. I teach CA Inter Audit, and my students have scored up to 95 marks in CA Intermediate Audit.

In this post, I will share my experience of over a decade of learning and teaching audit to CA Intermediate Audit. So if you are in CA Intermediate and you are not able to study or score good marks in audit, read the entire post and also share it with someone who needs it.

I also teach Audit to ACCA students, and it is completely a different ball game. I will post about it soon.

How your papers are checked?

First of all, let me tell you how your papers are checked. Basically, we will try to figure out what is expected from you and what is the mindset of the person who is checking your paper.

DISCLAIMER: These are my assumptions about audit paper checking; the basis of these assumptions is my experience of going through hundreds of ICAI-checked answer sheets of students.

Every person who checks your paper is provided with an answer key and marking scheme by ICAI.

Most of the time, you are given marks on the basis of the proximity of your answer to the answers given in the answer key provided by ICAI. The close your answer is to the answer key provided by ICAI, the more marks you will score.

Also, keep in mind checking paper is done by human beings!

Paper checking is a very boring task.

Some people just check the paper just as a side income-generating activity.

I also believe sometimes the person checking is not academically inclined towards the subject at all.

Last but not least, since human beings are involved, the involvement of human judgment and bias because of personal reasons, mood and environment cannot be avoided.

You can say that the above-mentioned points are like inherent limitations of ICAIs or, as a matter of fact, any institution’s exam check system involving humans.

Just an example, if ten people check the same answer written by the same person, not everyone will give the same marks.

If you have any insights on the paper checking procedure, please do let me know in the comment box.

Now, what to do?

Follow ICAI Study Material

Follow ICAI Study Material, most of the questions in the exam are from ICAI study material. They may ask in some indirect form, but most of them will be from ICAI study material.

And guess what, the answer provided to the Exam checker is also prepared from ICAI Study Material.

Are you getting it? If you want the language of your answer and the keywords to match the answer key, you have to study from ICAI study material.

You have to do “RATTAFICATION“ also.

Will only ratification help?

NO - you have to understand the concept and have to do a “RATTAFICATION“ of keywords.

You have to be a mixture of both Chatur and Rancho.

Understand the structure of ICAI’s Past answers

Read past suggested answers of ICAI.

Although ICAI never provides a marking scheme which is bizarre. As a CA, we need to do work according to standards, whether it is accounting or auditing or another kind of engagement, but when it comes to providing marking schemes (standards for checking exams ) to students, ICAI simply denies it.

If ICAI starts providing the marking scheme, it will be a game changer as it will help students how to score good marks. Also, things will be more fair and transparent, plus the accountability of the person checking the exams will be increased.

But ICAI never provides a marking scheme.

Now, how to understand the structure of answers to be written, read as many answers from past exams provided by ICAI in the form of suggested answers.

You will get a basic understanding of the

• Language
• Key-words
• How to quote sections, rules etc.
• How to present case-based questions.
• How to conclude answers.
• The basic idea (Not Very detailed) about the length of the answers to be written.

If possible, make a note of your observation after reading past suggested answers and try to replicate the structure and techniques followed by ICAI in your mock test and exams.

The above exercise will also give you direction on what to memorise while studying other chapters because now you will know a lot about the requirements of ICAI.

This was part of 1 of how to study CA Intermediate Audit.

Please share your feedback with me in the comment box.