Bac G1 Bénin common mistakes
Bac G1 Bénin · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Recording a transaction in the journal without checking that total debits equal total credits for that single entry, then discovering the imbalance only at the trial balance stage and being unable to locate it.
Candidates learn the double-entry rule as a slogan but practise entries one line at a time, so they never build the habit of verifying each entry before moving on. Under exam time pressure they write the debit, then the credit, and stop.
What to do instead
After every journal entry, physically add the debit column and the credit column for that entry and write a small tick only when they match. Train this on ten short entries per session until it becomes automatic, then apply the same check to compound entries with three or more accounts.
Confusing the roles of the journal, the grand livre and the balance: posting a transaction directly to the trial balance, or treating the balance as a list of accounts rather than as a summary of debit and credit totals per account.
The three documents are taught in one chapter and candidates memorise definitions without tracing the flow of information from chronological record to account grouping to verification summary. They can recite the definitions but cannot place a given figure at the right stage.
What to do instead
Draw the chain journal → grand livre → balance → états financiers once, and for every exercise write which document is being produced in the margin before starting. Practise converting a set of five journal entries into ledger accounts and then into a balance, labelling each step.
In cost accounting, allocating all indirect costs to products using a single volume-based driver such as direct labour hours, even when the exercise states that machine time, setup hours or order handling vary sharply between products.
Candidates default to the simplest allocation method they practised first and do not read the data carefully enough to notice that the cost driver given in the statement is not labour. They also fear that a multi-driver approach is 'too complicated' for the marks available.
What to do instead
Before allocating anything, list every indirect cost pool in the question and write beside it the driver explicitly named or implied in the text. If more than one driver appears, use activity-based costing. Then check that total allocated cost equals total indirect cost as a control total.
Treating fixed costs per unit as constant when volume changes, so that a production increase is shown as raising unit cost or a decrease as lowering it, and break-even points are computed with a per-unit fixed cost figure.
Candidates mix up total cost behaviour with unit cost behaviour. Because fixed cost per unit falls as volume rises, they carry a single per-unit number into a new volume scenario instead of keeping fixed cost in total.
What to do instead
Always separate total fixed cost from variable cost per unit at the start of a problem and never write a fixed cost as a per-unit figure except as a derived result. Recompute break-even as total fixed cost divided by contribution per unit, and sanity-check by asking whether the answer changes if volume doubles.
In financial mathematics, applying a proportional rate for a fraction of a year when the question specifies compound interest, or mixing simple and compound formulae within the same exercise.
The simple interest formula is learned first and is arithmetically easier, so under pressure candidates reach for it even when the wording says capitalisation, placement or 'intérêts composés'. They also fail to convert the stated annual rate to the period actually used.
What to do instead
Before computing, underline the words in the question that indicate the regime and write 'simple' or 'compound' at the top of the answer. Then write the rate per period and the number of periods explicitly, converting the annual rate to a monthly or quarterly basis, before substituting into any formula.
Reporting a mean, a standard deviation or a regression result without checking the units and the scale of the data, for example averaging percentages of different bases or reading a standard deviation in euros as a percentage.
Applied statistics questions often supply data in mixed units or as already-aggregated percentages. Candidates compute mechanically and do not step back to ask whether the resulting number is plausible or what it measures.
What to do instead
Before computing, write the unit of every variable in the table. After computing, state the result with its unit in a full sentence and test plausibility: a standard deviation larger than the range, or a mean outside the minimum and maximum, signals an error. For grouped data, use class midpoints and state that choice.
Answering a labour law question by quoting the general principle and stopping, without applying the probation period, notice period, severance or dismissal procedure rules that the scenario actually turns on.
Candidates revise the broad structure of the Code du travail but not the numeric thresholds and procedural steps, and they write generalities because they cannot recall the specific duration or formality required.
What to do instead
Build a one-page table per topic (probation, notice, severance, dismissal procedure, leave) with the duration, the condition and the consequence of breach. In the exam, identify the precise legal question asked, state the rule with its figures, then apply it to the named facts and conclude.
In monetary economics, describing money creation by commercial banks as if each deposit could be lent out in full, or confusing the money supply aggregates with the central bank's balance sheet.
The mechanism is taught through simplified stories and candidates retain the story but not the constraint. They also memorise the labels M1, M2, M3 without knowing what distinguishes them.
What to do instead
Learn the mechanism as a chain: deposit, reserve requirement, excess reserves, credit, new deposit, with the multiplier written as one over the reserve ratio. For aggregates, memorise one concrete example of an instrument in each (currency and demand deposits in M1, savings deposits in M2, negotiable instruments in M3) and practise classifying five items.
In management and organisation questions, listing the functions of management or the types of structure as a definition, without linking the chosen structure or style to the size, technology and environment of the firm described in the case.
Candidates treat organisation theory as vocabulary to reproduce rather than as a diagnostic tool. Case questions reward application, but reproduction feels safer and faster under time pressure.
What to do instead
For every case, write three lines first: what the firm produces, how large it is, how uncertain its environment is. Then choose the structure or management style that fits those three facts and justify it with one sentence per fact, plus one sentence on the disadvantage the choice creates.
In management information systems, describing spreadsheet or database operations in vague prose ('use a formula', 'sort the data') instead of writing the exact function, its arguments and the expected result, and confusing a spreadsheet formula with a database query.
Candidates study these tools by watching demonstrations and never write the syntax themselves, so they cannot reproduce a lookup, a conditional sum or a filter under exam conditions.
What to do instead
Practise writing from memory the exact form of the functions the syllabus requires, with argument order and one worked example each, and state the expected output for a given sample table. Keep a clear line between spreadsheet functions and database selection criteria, and answer with the syntax plus the result, not a description.
In professional writing tasks, producing a letter or report with no addressee, no object line, no date and no closing formula, or mixing the register of a formal letter with that of an internal note.
Candidates focus on content and treat the layout as decoration, and they have not internalised which formulae belong to which type of document. Time pressure pushes them straight into the body of the text.
What to do instead
Memorise a fixed skeleton for each document type (letter, note, report, memorandum) with its mandatory elements in order. In the exam, write the skeleton first with the addressee, object and formula in place, then fill the body, and reserve two minutes at the end to verify that every mandatory element is present and the register is consistent.