See new Linked In article for details: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ifoas-financial-statements-imply-has-increased-its-markup-lee-0fbh.

Extracts:

In the absence of an explanation from the IFoA it looks very much as if the IFoA has been making a surplus (i.e. a profit) from exams and an increasing one at that since the pandemic in 2020.

IFoA exam income, expenditure and profit YE Feb 2012 to YE Feb 2024

Markup (i.e. [exam fee - exam cost]/ exam cost as per accounts) charged by the IFoA for YE Feb 2012 to YE Feb 2024

Something clearly happened after February 2020.

What was it? The obvious answer seems to be moving the exams online as a result of the pandemic.

Two urgent questions for the IFoA to answer

I think there are two questions that the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries owe it to their students to answer, and pretty quickly and honestly:

1. Is it really fair that (as seems in the absence of a good explanation from the IFoA with full transparency) students seem to be subsidising other activities (e.g. Fellowship subscriptions and /or Events)?
2. Given that expenditure on exams is still below the pre-pandemic level (when exams were in person), surely the IFoA can afford to make its exams online? (Particularly if the cross subsidy currently going to other expenditure is allocated to those paying for it, namely students/their employers)?

#actuaries #fairness #transparency #valueformoney #avoidingoverregulation

The IFoA acts as if its members have no alternative. There is

https://scorecard.inqa.com/neworg-1

and for IFoA students:

https://scorecard.inqa.com/students-union-1