We caught up with Hannah Ferrett, a Kaplan learner and accountant at Deloitte who recently received the first prize for her ACA BPI exam paper in the September 2023 sitting.
Although she got such a great result, it wasn’t without its challenges. Here’s some of Hannah’s tips and advice…
Can you tell us about your career so far?
I came to work at Deloitte in December 2021 on the Audit Graduate Scheme straight after finishing university after studying accounting and finance. I’ve since completed my Certificate and Professional Level in the ACA qualification within the Insurance department.
How would you compare studying ACA to university?
It was a massive step up, and a lot harder than I expected. I think university was a lot easier, but with a professional qualification, about 55% can be a pass and it sounds like it’ll be fine but it can be very difficult to reach that grade.
It’s definitely been a big adjustment and every exam is a different kind of learning curve, but it’s been a good challenge and I’ve had a lot of support.
Recently, with the Professional Level, it’s felt very relevant to my job role which is good as some modules like the BPI were very specific to the insurance industry. So it’s not only helped me with the terminology but also with what I do day-to-day in my job.
Did you encounter any challenges during your study so far?
I failed the ACA BPI paper at first, that was a challenge. I got 38% which wasn't very good and it hit me quite hard.
In the past, I’ve gotten through my studies with no problems, so when I failed this one it felt like a big setback. But once I had my resit exam confirmed, it gave me the determination to throw everything into it.
But looking back, failing the exam and resitting it has given me the confidence and belief that no matter what, I can pass the final three exams. And then passing and doubling my grade just showed how hard work really does pay off. It was quite an unusual exam as I’d never sat an open book exam before, so it’s definitely something I had to get used to.
How have you found the support from Kaplan?
When I failed that exam, I was emailed by one of the Academic Support tutors, Stephanie Keenan, who then gave me a call and helped me plan for my studies and work out how to approach the exam again, she was so supportive. It’s quite difficult to do it by yourself because it felt like I didn’t do the exam right the first time so I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it differently.
Steph helped me approach it from a different direction and would help with a study timeline and what I should be working towards each week. Honestly, without that, I would have felt lost. She’d also give me calls after I did my mock exam and we’d go through the answers together and she’d give me extra questions to work on and mark it herself.
Overall, she just gave me a lot of focus and support and completely understood how I felt.
How did you feel when you found out you got first in the world in your ACA BPI exam?
I’m not going to lie, I just sat there and cried. I came out of the resit exam and I felt like I failed again. It was so hard to tell if it went well so I didn’t have much hope.
When the results came out, I was really nervous. I was so shocked that I did well in the exam, but I didn’t realise how well I did until I got that letter from ICAEW. A lot of the partners in my department then messaged me to congratulate me so it was really nice to know that they were routing for me.
What advice would you give to others who are studying?
I think the most important thing, right from the beginning, is to understand what’s expected from an exam. For example, I would rely on similar questions that could come up, and then I’d prepare with an exam for a question that had been used in previous exam papers and hope to wing it and be fine. But I think, looking back, it’s important to make sure you actually understand the content so that you can apply it to any question they throw at you.
Another thing is to start early, and also I think the tutors and support are so helpful. So it’s important to realise that they’re there for you to always help - so make the most of that too.
If you fail an exam, I think after speaking to people, you realise how common it is. It can happen to the best of us so you need to work through it and hopefully, that will also give you more confidence for future exams.
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