ACCA Paper Taxation TX F6 Exam Preparation Guide

Taxation TX, previously known as F6, is a different type of paper in the ACCA journey due to its unprecedented nature. Your journey starts with learning Accounting, finance, business laws, and management.

Once you get comfortable with the aforementioned subjects, suddenly, a whole different type of subject appears. The ACCA TX F6 is ALL about taxation and deals with both the rules and calculations involved in Taxation.

Due to its out of the blue entrance, many students find the paper a difficult one to pass. Most TX F6 textbooks in the market are way lengthy and cost students a fair share of their time and even sometimes, make them miss an attempt or two!

But then again, there are a lot of students who get to pass F6 TX easily without facing such issues. If you want to pass the ACCA TX F6 on your first attempt, that too in a short period of time, it is advisable you follow the following strategy.

Passing the ACCA Paper TX F6

• Understanding the Subject: Unlike most of the ACCA papers, Tx F6 is straight and simple. There are very few complications and the questions are mostly based on tax rules and regulations.

• Understanding the TX F6 Examiner: ACCA is a centrally regulated body but the examiners are different for each ACCA paper. TX F6 is no different.
• To understand what the examiner expects from a student, you should check out the examiner’s reports for paper F6 TX on the Official Website of ACCA. It will help you develop the best technique to answer questions in the paper.

The Challenges in TX F6 ACCA

If you’re among the students who are scared of number crunching, hold your horses, F6 TX is going to be your nightmare.

The ACCA TX F6 paper is solely based on calculating different taxes with limited theory involved.

How to Tackle:

“Practice maketh a man perfect”

Whether you like numbers or not, it’s time to play with them. Read and learn the tax rules for a topic and spend most of your time in calculations, applying the rules.

That being said, get yourself an exam kit, preferably Kaplan for TX F6. Once you cover a chapter, solve its questions from the kit and try to speed up as you learn more and more techniques.

In papers like TX F6, selecting a concise study note is important. Kaplan and BPP study texts for paper F6 are 600+ pages and will spare you little time for the kit.

I strongly recommend the Open Tuition Notes & Lectures for TX F6.

Key Areas to Focus in ACCA TX F6

The Tx F6 syllabus covers the following 5 areas.

1. Income Tax
2. Capital Gains Tax
3. Corporation Tax
4. Inheritance Tax
5. Value Added Tax

There are perceptions about the importance of each of the above areas for exam. Some students believe that Income Tax is the cornerstone for passing F6 TX and they prioritize Income Tax over other areas.

Yes, Income Tax is an important area but merely focusing on Income Tax certainly isn’t a wise strategy to pass the ACCA F6 paper.

Each of the syllabus areas has its own importance and you should even expect a mixed question covering 2 or more syllabus areas.

As a rule of thumb, you should be able to calculate income tax and corporation tax computations and the capital gains for both individuals and companies.

Inheritance Tax has been examined more and more lately and it seems like the examiner has a taste for it.

Value Added Tax is surprisingly becoming a better part of the paper, considering the chapter only has few topics. The examiner often tests its theory but due to its upward trend, you should expect VAT calculations.

The Role of Past Papers & Mock Exams in TX F6

Due to the involvement of calculations, the exam of F6 TX is time consuming and you need to speed up both your mind and fingers. The best way to do that is to practice as much as you can.

Now, book and kit practice is one thing. Solving a paper in which each question is from a different chapter and of a different nature is way more difficult and requires one to have a broad understanding of the syllabus.

Once you’ve covered the book and kit, it’s time to start solving past papers and mock exams available on ACCA Global.

Try to solve at least 10 past papers under exam conditions. That means;

• Keep your phone away.
• Avoid browsing.
• Don’t cheat.
• Complete the paper in 03:00 hours.

After completing the paper, compare your answers and point out your mistakes. If the mistakes are minor, avoid them the second time. If there’s something wrong with your understanding of a topic, you need to go back to your study notes.

Exam preparation paper TX F6: Final Note

F6 TX is a paper that requires time and continuous effort. Not something to master in a day or week but is going to take a fair share of your time.

The key to pass:

Be consistent no matter how many mistakes you make. Once you learn to properly implement the tax rules, you’re going to love it.

Practice, Practice and practice. It will help you solve question quickly, spare you time to focus on the complicated ones.

On a positive note, due to its straightforward nature, you can expect 80+ marks easily, should you prepare it well. Best of luck for your F6 exam!