How to write your ADIT answer like a marker, not like a student
Prepared candidates fail ADIT papers every sitting, and it is rarely because they did not know enough. It is because they wrote down everything they knew instead of answering the question that was asked. A marker is not sitting there admiring your knowledge. They are working down a mark scheme, ticking points as they find them. If you write to impress, you make those points hard to find. If you write to be marked, you make them easy. That single change of audience, writing for the marker rather than for yourself, is worth more than another week of reading.
Markers award points, so make your points findable
The scheme is a list of specific points, each worth a mark or two. So give the marker one clear point per paragraph, stated plainly at the start of it, then developed. Do not bury three marks inside one dense block where a tired examiner has to dig them out. Short, labelled, separated points beat a beautiful essay every time, because every point you make that matches the scheme is a tick, and ticks are the whole game.
Apply the source, do not copy it out
You can take the OECD Model and the Transfer Pricing Guidelines into the room, which tells you something important, nobody gets marks for reproducing them. The marks are for applying them to the facts you have been given. Quote the article or the paragraph briefly, then spend your words on what it means for this taxpayer, in this fact pattern. A candidate who writes that Article 5 means the office in Country B is likely a permanent establishment, and says why, is being marked well. A candidate who copies out Article 5 in full is spending time for nothing.
In Principles of International Taxation, essays need a spine
The essay style questions reward a position, not a data dump. Decide what your answer is in the first line, then use the rest to defend it with authority and application. An examiner can follow an argument that goes somewhere. They cannot award much to a tour of everything you remember about the topic.
Spend the clock in proportion to the marks
Work out your minutes per mark before you start writing, then hold to it. The most common self inflicted failure is a polished answer to question one and a thin, rushed question three, when the marks were even. When your time for a part is up, leave a gap and move on. You can come back, but you cannot get back marks you never reached.
The core shift
- Write to be marked: one clear point per paragraph, stated at the start, so every point is easy to find.
- Apply, do not recite: the OECD Model and TP Guidelines are permitted texts, so recall earns nothing, application earns the marks.
- Take a position: essays need a spine and a conclusion, not a tour of the topic.
- Budget by marks: minutes in proportion to marks, and leave a gap when time is up.
The career this is really about
The skill in this whole post, applying a source to a fact pattern under time pressure, is not just an exam trick. It is the daily job in the roles ADIT opens: transfer pricing associate at a Big Four firm, in-house international tax analyst inside a multinational, cross-border advisory at a mid-tier practice. The examiner is testing the same thing those employers hire for, which is why the technique is worth building now rather than treating it as a hoop.
We keep coming back to this because it is a running theme here, not a closing line on a technique post. Each week Global Tax Studies pulls out the roles these exams open, the newly qualified positions worth watching, and the routes MojiTax candidates take after they pass, so the paper in front of you always sits next to the job it leads to.
MojiTaxWant to practise answering to the scheme?
Global Tax Studies is run by the team at MojiTax, whose ADIT materials are written to the syllabus and marked against the examiner scheme, which is exactly the habit above. There are lessons, exam-style questions and marked mocks across the Principles and option modules, and you can look inside on a free trial first. We always say when we are pointing at our own courses, and this is one of those times.
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Sitting ADIT this winter, or working on your technique? Compare answers and plans with other candidates. Pick whichever room you already live in: our WhatsApp group, the LinkedIn group, the Facebook group. They all connect back through the Global Tax Studies community page.
Sources: CIOT ADIT syllabus and permitted texts guidance at tax.org.uk/adit; OECD Model Tax Convention and Transfer Pricing Guidelines at oecd.org.