CAT 2016: Exam fee goes up, Trend followed by other exams; have you decided on your pick?

Not only CAT 2016 but almost all the MBA entrance exams have opted for increase in test fee by around 10% and unless you decide which are your favourite exams for admission to MBA/PGDM 2017-19 batch, the increase is ready to make a big hole in your pocket even before you get admission in the B-school of your choice.

Top B-schools accepting different exam scores
The decision to choose the selected entrance exams has to be taken as apart from CAT 2016 which is the mandatory exam for admission to 20 IIMs, FMS Delhi, MDI Gurgaon, IMI New Delhi, Management courses at IITs, SPJIMR among others, you have other entrance tests namely IIFT 2016 entrance exam for MBA (International Business) 2017-19; SNAP 2016 for admission to 14 Symbiosis Institutes; NMAT by GMAC for admission to NMIMS Mumbai and other B-schools; MAT 2016 September exam for admission to 164 B-schools as per the list published by AIMA; XAT 2017 for admission to XLRI and more than 140 B-schools in the country and CMAT 2017 proposed to be conducted in the month of January 2017.

Difficult to afford all
If you choose to appear in all the entrance exams, it may be difficult as many of the entrance exams do not offer as good a B-school as you may like. Besides a lot of money you will have to spend only to register and apply. On the top of it, you may not find the test city across all the places in the country.

Key details of National level MBA entrance exams

CAT 2016

• Exam fee: Rs.1700/- (Increased from earlier Rs.1600/-)
• Last date to apply: September 22, 2016
• Application process: Online
• Number of test cities: 138
• Top Institutes: IIMs; FMS; IMI; MDI; SPJIMR; IITs
• Exam Date: December 4, 2016
• Exam pattern: Computer based test

IIFT 2016

• Exam fee: Rs.1550/- (No increase)
• Last date to apply: September 5, 2016
• Application Process: Online and Offline
• Number of test cities: 20
• Top Institutes: IIFT Delhi & Kolkata
• Exam Date: November 27, 2016
• Exam pattern: Paper based Test

NMAT by GMAC

• Exam fee: Rs.1700/- (Increased from earlier Rs.1600/-; facility of late registration, retake, reschedule at additional cost)
• Last date to apply: October 3, 2016
• Application Process: Online
• Number of test cities: 24
• Top Institutes: NMIMS
• Exam Date: 75 days test window from October 7 to December 20, 2016
• Exam pattern: Online computer based

SNAP 2016

• Exam fee: Rs.1500/- (Under revision, updates after Aug 21)
• Last date to apply: November 22, 2016
• Application Process: Online
• Number of test cities: 30
• Top Institutes: Symbiosis Institute of Management Pune and other 13 institutes
• Exam Date: December 18, 2016
• Exam pattern: Paper Based test

XAT 2017

• Exam fee: Rs.1600/- (increased from earlier Rs.1500/-)
• Last date to apply: November 30 without late fee; December 11 with late fee of Rs.400/-
• Application Process: Online
• Number of test cities: 47 in India, 2 abroad
• Top Institutes: XLRI; IMT; SPJIMR; XIMB
• Exam Date: January 8, 2017
• Exam pattern: Paper Based test

MAT 2016 September exam

• Exam fee: Rs.1200/- (No increase)
• Last date to apply: August 23, 2016
• Application Process: Online & Offline
• Number of test cities: 51 for PBT; 12 for CBT
• Top Institutes: AIMA shares list of 164 institutes
• Exam Date: September 4 for paper based test; September 10, 2016 for Computer based test
• Exam pattern: Choice of Paper Based and Computer Based exam

CMAT 2017

• Information shared below on CMAT 2017 is on expected lines as per the last AICTE CMAT exam which was conducted on January 17, 2016.
• Exam fee: Rs.1400/-
• Regn opening date: 1st week of November
• Last date to apply: Second week of December 2016
• Application Process: Online
• Number of test cities: 62
• Top Institutes: 400 AICTE approved B-schools to accept CMAT scores
• Exam Date: January 15, 2017 (Expected)
• Exam pattern: Online Computer Based test

How to decide
Prof S K Agarwal, expert and mentor on MBA entrance exam preparation shares 3 key parameters to decide which exam you should opt for
Gateway to top B-schools
Choose the exam that is gateway to top B-schools in India so when you opt for CAT 2016 or XAT 2017 you will find that you have covered almost all the top B-schools including IIMs, XLRI among others.

But again there are other top B-schools who do not accept either CAT or XAT. For example NMIMS Mumbai one of the top B-schools accepts scores of only NMAT by GMAC; Symbiosis Pune and other 13 B-schools accept only SNAP scores; IIFT will accept its own entrance exam scores.

So apart from one or two top common MBA entrance exams, you have to select the institute specific MBA entrance test, if you are interested to explore admission opportunity to them.
Location of test city and exam dates
CAT 2016 has maximum number of test cities, followed by MAT 2016 September and XAT 2017 exams. NMAT by GMAC and SNAP also have good number of test cities. AICTE has yet to announce the test cities for CMAT 2017.
If the test city is far away and the travel time is more and also you have some other important MBA or other important exam, you should devise the plan whether to opt for the clashing or very near exam dates as you may not be able to attend both the exams.

How necessary to bear financial burden?
There are number of top B-schools who accept more than one exam scores. For example, most of the top institutes like SPJIMR, IMT, TAPMI, XIMB among others will accept both CAT 2016 and XAT 2017 scores. You can opt for either of these two exams. If you wish to be considered for admission to XLRI also, you have to appear in XAT 2017 as XLRI accepts only XAT scores.
Similarly, if you wish to be considered by IIMs, FMS, MDI, you must appear in CAT 2016 as these B-schools do not accept any other exam score.
The decision has to be taken only by you according to your preferences. It will be better to decide as soon as possible as the closing dates for the exam registration will be approaching one by one shortly.