You have narrowed it down to two options. Both look correct. One is the textbook rule; the other is the answer a real solicitor would actually give a client sitting in front of them. Which do you pick? This is the moment where SQE1 is won or lost, and it happens roughly 360 times across your two exam days. Understanding exactly how Single Best Answer questions are marked changes how you read every one of them.
Let me walk you through the machinery behind the score, then the specific traps that catch strong candidates in both FLK1 and FLK2.
How SQE1 Single Best Answer questions are actually marked
First, the shape of the assessment. SQE1 is two papers: FLK1 and FLK2. Each contains 180 Single Best Answer multiple-choice questions, and you get 5 hours 20 minutes per paper. That is a little under 90 seconds per question, including reading a scenario that can run to a full paragraph.
Now the scoring itself, and this part matters more than people expect. Every question is worth exactly one mark. There is no negative marking. A hard question about a rare exception carries the same single mark as an easy one about a core rule. There is no partial credit for choosing a "nearly right" option — the SBA format gives you one best answer among five, and only that answer scores.
Because there is no penalty for a wrong guess, you should never leave a question blank. A blank scores zero; a considered guess has a real chance of scoring one. Answer everything.
The pass mark is not fixed at a round number like 50%. The SRA sets it for each sitting using a standard-setting process, so the raw percentage you need can move between diets. Your two FLK results are also combined in the way described in the current SRA specification, which is why a strong FLK1 can help carry a wobbly FLK2 — within limits. Do not treat one paper as disposable.
Why "single best" is not the same as "only correct"
Here is the idea that reframes the whole exam. The word is best, not correct. On a well-written SBA question, more than one option can be technically true. Your job is to find the one that most completely and accurately answers the precise question asked, applied to the facts you were given.
Take a negligence scenario. Following Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] AC 562, you know a duty of care can arise. But if the question asks what the claimant must prove to succeed, an option stating "the defendant owed a duty of care" is true yet incomplete — duty, breach, causation and recoverable loss together form the better answer. The trap option is not false. It is just not the best.
This is why speed-reading the options first, before the facts, backfires. The distractors are engineered to look plausible in isolation. They only reveal themselves as wrong when measured against the exact wording of the question stem.
Read the last line first
A practical habit: read the final sentence of the question — the actual instruction — before you read the long factual scenario. "Which of the following is the client's best course of action?" is a different task from "Which statement best explains why the claim will fail?" Knowing the target before you wade through the facts stops you answering a question the examiner never asked.
Common FLK1 traps: Contract, Tort and Business Law
FLK1 covers English Legal System, Contract Law, Business Law and Practice, Dispute Resolution, Tort Law, Constitutional and Administrative Law and EU Law, and Legal Services. The traps here tend to be about rule versus exception.
In Contract Law, an option will state a clean general rule, while the facts quietly contain the exception. Consideration must be sufficient but need not be adequate — fine, but the scenario may involve part payment of a debt, dragging you into promissory estoppel territory. The "obvious" answer is a distractor built from a rule you know well but applied to facts where an exception governs.
In Business Law and Practice, watch the default rules. Under the Partnership Act 1890, partners share profits equally unless they agree otherwise — and questions love to slip in a partnership agreement clause that displaces the default, then offer you the default answer as bait. Read for whether the parties contracted out.
Tort questions frequently test defences and remoteness rather than the headline duty. A defendant may owe a duty and breach it, yet the loss is too remote, or a defence like consent applies. The best answer is often the one that spots the reason the claim fails, not the one confirming a duty exists.
Trap pattern to memorise: the examiner states a true general rule as one option and hides a governing exception in the facts. If an answer feels too easy on a hard-looking scenario, re-read the facts for the twist.
Common FLK2 traps: procedure, numbers and time limits
FLK2 is Property Law and Practice, Solicitor Accounts, Land Law, Trusts Law, Wills and the Administration of Estates, and Criminal Law and Practice. The traps shift from rule-versus-exception to precision — exact figures, exact deadlines, exact procedural steps.
Solicitor Accounts is the clearest example. A question may hand you a transaction and four ledger entries that are almost identical, differing only in whether a sum sits in the client or business account, or in which side of the ledger it lands. There is no room to "argue" here — one entry complies with the SRA Accounts Rules and the rest do not. Candidates who never practised the double-entry mechanics lose these marks even when they understand the principle.
In Wills and the Administration of Estates, and in Property, distractors are built from close-but-wrong sequencing. Which step comes before which? Who has priority? Get the order of an administration or a conveyancing chain slightly wrong and a perfectly reasonable-sounding option is still the wrong best answer.
Criminal Law and Practice loves the technical threshold — the difference between two offences, or the point at which a procedural right arises. The facts will be drafted so that a single detail tips the classification. Miss it, and you confidently choose the neighbouring offence.
Build a numbers-and-dates flashcard deck
For FLK2 especially, make a small deck of nothing but figures, thresholds and time limits, and drill it with active recall. When a question turns on an exact number, there is no reasoning your way there — you either know it or you guess. Turn as many of those guesses as possible into knowns.
A repeatable method for working each SBA question
Under time pressure, a consistent routine beats improvisation. Here is one that works across both papers:
- Read the instruction line at the end first, so you know the target.
- Read the facts once, marking the detail that changes the outcome — a date, a clause, a party's role.
- Predict your own answer before looking at the five options. This stops the distractors from steering you.
- Eliminate the clearly wrong options, then choose the most complete and accurate of what remains.
- If two survive, ask which one a solicitor would actually advise on these facts. That is usually the best answer.
- Flag and move on if you stall past two minutes. Bank the easy marks; there are 180 of them per paper.
One more discipline: trust your first, reasoned choice. Changing answers on a vague second-guess costs more marks than it saves. Only change when you spot a concrete fact you had genuinely misread.
Because SQE1 has no negative marking, your last five minutes should be spent ensuring every single question has an answer selected. Sweep for blanks before you finish.
Remember too that SQE1 and SQE2 test different things. SQE1 is these knowledge-based SBAs; SQE2 assesses five practical skills — Client Interviewing, Advocacy, Case and Matter Analysis, Legal Research and Legal Writing/Drafting — and is marked by assessors, not a machine. The habits above are for SQE1, though the underlying discipline of answering the precise question asked serves you well in both.
How CELE SQE can help you drill the SBA format
The fastest way to stop falling for these traps is volume of exposure to well-built questions with clear explanations, so the patterns become familiar. Our SQE1 Question Bank runs at £575 per month, and full preparation courses range from the Short-term Course at £1,750 to the Long-term Course at £3,720, with single-FLK options at half those prices and £150 off for early birds. If you are already at the SQE2 stage, our £1,450 course includes 61 full mock questions built to the official SRA format. Come and say hello at celebar.com or on WeChat SQE100 — no pressure, just help from tutors who have coached candidates since the very first sitting.