So I took level 2 yesterday and felt pretty good about my preparation.
As I believe many other people do, I like to cross my answers on the exam booklet as I go through it. Then at some point in the second half of the three hours I start copying the answers to the scoring sheet, but without wasting too much time making sure that the ovals are filled completely. Finally, in the last 15 minutes or so I take the time to make sure the ovals are colored completely.
In yesterday’s morning session I miscounted how many minutes I had left before time was up, and the alarm when off as I was halfway through making sure that the ovals were properly filled. The remaining half of the answers were marked with dark round signs that covered roughly 50% or so of the oval. These signs were meant to be permanent, so as I said they were dark and kind of heavy, they just did not cover all of the oval. Now I am wondering, will the machine be able to read my answers? Does anyone know how sensitive they are? My guess would be that the answers will be read by the machine. I think CFA stresses on the fact that you need to fill the ovals completely because they want to make sure people dont half-hass it, but that if you make a clear sign the machine will read it. At least this is what I want to believe, but I dont really know.
Also, should I fail because the machine doesn’t read my answers, I am thinking retabulation. The CFA website says “Exam score retabulation is a process wherein CFA Institute staff manually verifies that all parts of all questions answered in accordance with the instructions were found and graded and that the scores were added correctly.” Strictly speaking, my answers were not in accordance with the instructions since I did not fill the ovals completely, however the answers would appear inequivocable to any human being who examined the scoring sheet, so I would like to think that CFA would use common sense and give me those points.
Please tell me that I am right.