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Pass rates announced for September 2023 ACCA exam sitting

Pass rates have been announced by ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) for students who sat their exams in September 2023.

89,719 entered for the September sitting, which saw 104,389 exams completed. A total of 3,763 students completed their final exams to become ACCA affiliates.

Alan Hatfield, executive director – content, quality and innovation, said:

‘ACCA students continue to strive towards their ambition of reaching ACCA membership. We’re delighted to see so many of them succeed, as shown by this set of pleasing results.’

This session saw some exciting changes to the Essentials exams at the Strategic Professional stage that both support student wellbeing and deliver employability skills:

  • For Strategic Business Leader, students were provided with pre-seen two weeks before their exam, this approach gives students the opportunity to understand the information presented prior to the exam. This also mirrors a work environment where it is normal to receive papers in advance. More information can be found at our website.
  • For Strategic Business Reporting, the format of question one changed. It now uses a prepopulated spreadsheet response option containing a draft consolidated financial statement. This new style format requires students to record, analyse and present information aligning with how spreadsheets are used by finance professionals in a working environment. Again, our website has more information on this change.

We continue to encourage all students to make full use of our learning resources to support their studies towards the examinations. We also recommend that all our students use the ACCA exam Practice Platform, a free resource allowing them to practise questions and attempt mock exams with software that simulates the real exam platform. Accompanying the platform are guides to self-marking and debrief resources, to help students and tutors better understand performance. Pass rates remain up to 20% better for students who use the platform.

Exam results

The ACCA Qualification rigorously tests the skills, abilities and competencies that a modern accountant needs, with a firm grounding in ethics and professionalism. It prepares students for a rewarding career as a qualified and ethical finance professional.

Results below also include those delivered via ACCA’s on-demand offering for Foundation Diplomas, Applied Knowledge and Law exams. These accounted for a further 30,044 exams, of which 2,617 were made possible through remote invigilation.

ACCA QualificationPass rate (%)
Applied Skills 
LW – Corporate and Business Law84%
TX – Taxation54%
FR – Financial Reporting47%
PM – Performance Management40%
FM – Financial Management49%
AA – Audit and Assurance42%
Strategic Professional – Essentials 
SBL – Strategic Business Leader50%
SBR – Strategic Business Reporting50%
Strategic Professional – Options 
AAA – Advanced Audit and Assurance34%
AFM – Advanced Financial Management45%
APM – Advanced Performance Management34%
ATX – Advanced Taxation48%

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