What Is Own-Figure Marking in ACCA?

Own-figure marking — sometimes called the 'own error' rule or follow-through marking — is one of the most reassuring features of ACCA marking, and one that too many students don't know they can rely on. It means that when you make an arithmetic slip early in a calculation, you still earn the method marks for every later step that correctly uses your wrong figure. You lose the mark for the error itself, not everything that flows from it.

A worked example

Suppose an NPV question, and you calculate contribution wrongly at the first step. If you then correctly apply tax, discount at the right rate, and total the present values using your incorrect contribution, you earn the marks for tax, discounting and totalling. Only the contribution figure itself is denied. The examiner is rewarding that you knew the method, not that you happened to add up correctly.

Why showing your workings is everything

Own-figure marks can only be given if the marker can see your steps. If you do a calculation in your head and write a single final number, there's nothing to follow through — one wrong figure, no marks. Laying out every step in a clear working is what unlocks the rule. This is why 'show your workings' is not a formality; it's where most of the marks live in a computational question.

The one thing own-figure marking won't do

It won't rescue a wrong method. If the approach itself is wrong — discounting at the wrong rate, treating a whole loan as tax-deductible — that step scores zero. Own-figure protects arithmetic slips within a correct method, not a flawed method.

The catch is that it's impossible to tell whether your workings are laid out well enough to earn own-figure marks just by rereading them. The 50% Club marks your practice answers against the official ACCA scheme, showing exactly which method marks your workings earned and where a hidden step cost you — so you learn to write calculations that score even when the numbers wobble.