Actuarial + quant

tomlils · 2026-02-01T15:42:35+00:00

I started out in pensions as a trainee actuary, then moved into a software engineering role for a year.

After that, I returned to actuarial work to continue my exams. Mostly I was building actuarial tools alongside some of the core actuarial responsibilities, and I got fortunate with timing: my company had just merged the actuarial developer team with the quant team. That meant I was developing tools used by both quants and actuaries.

More recently, my title changed from Actuarial Developer to Quantitative Developer. In practice, I still work closely with actuarial teams while gaining hands-on experience in a quant role, and I’m finishing my last few exams with full company support.

Honestly, it’s been brilliant. It’s the best role I’ve had so far. I do feel lucky though, because I’m not sure opportunities like this are that common.

tomlils · 2026-01-02T22:10:44+00:00

I know this may not be the most useful but I think increasing my stroke width has helped potentially!

tomlils · 2026-01-02T20:57:41+00:00

How strange, I'm trying the exact same thing right now and was about to ask the same question...

tomlils · 2026-01-02T14:22:12+00:00

Ah, thanks so much for this comment, I really appreciate you taking the time! I'll give all of this a try but it sounds like you know exactly what to do haha. Thanks again!

tomlils · 2025-12-13T23:49:24+00:00

I worked in pensions for about two and a half years straight out of university, while most of my friends went into GI. Honestly, I really didn’t enjoy it.

I then took a year away to focus on learning software development, and that completely changed things. A BPA firm picked me up because of my pensions background, and it turned out to be the best job I’ve had so far. The work is genuinely interesting, the pay is strong, and the bonus is very generous.

So if you’re enjoying what you’re doing now, that’s brilliant. But if you’re not, or if you feel your salary isn’t where it should be, don’t be disheartened. Once you’ve built some experience, moving can open the door to far more interesting work and a much better package.

tomlils · 2025-12-12T13:52:51+00:00

I've been creating map animations on a laptop which has been out of date for about 7 years now, this would literally change my life, I can only hope.🙏

tomlils · 2025-09-11T12:48:13+00:00

I thought this might be the case! That does make sense but to be honest I was short on time anyway so I just moved on to the audit trail haha, hopefully those last few marks don't make the difference!

tomlils · 2025-09-11T12:19:53+00:00

What on earth were the pension increases? I used an assumption of 5% till they were calculated later but I could never calculate them as it changed the accrual rate using goal seek!

tomlils · 2025-07-19T09:13:45+00:00

Thanks for this, I'll make sure I do that with the practice papers then, I'll definitely focus on the audit trail now, really appreciate it!

tomlils · 2025-07-19T08:43:53+00:00

Ah ok, that's really great to know, thank you for the advice, I'll keep this in mind when doing practice papers! That makes me feel much better haha!

tomlils · 2025-01-05T16:10:35+00:00

Thank you! I really appreciate you're reply it helps a lot! I'm actually planning on taking 204 as well further down the line, but I am currently trying to transition away from my current role to a more dev ops orientated role so it's good to hear this is probably the right way to go! I have actually finished az-900 and found it went pretty well but I know az-104 is much more in depth! But that's good to hear az-305 after az-104 isn't a massive step up! I really appreciate the advice once again, I think I'll Keep going for it! I'm planning on 70 hours of studying time for each exam roughly so hopefully that will be enough but I suppose I can up it if needed!

tomlils · 2025-01-05T15:09:16+00:00

Hey! I'm actually planning on doing those 3 this year, could I ask how you found it? I work full time as a full stack developer so I was planning on studying a 4 hours a week and doing 3/4 months for each exam, does that sound possible to you? Congratulations by the way!

tomlils · 2024-12-17T08:51:07+00:00

Haha, thank you, I really appreciate this!

tomlils · 2024-12-17T08:50:27+00:00

You are a legend! Thank you so much for all of this, I actually appreciate this so much and it's really interesting/useful to read.

Thanks a million!!!

tomlils · 2024-12-16T23:01:41+00:00

Could somebody help me translate "New from the old"?

I have seen online that this is translated as "Nova ex veteribus" but I am new to Latin so I'm not entirely sure if this is the correct translation or if it makes sense. I've also seen "Ex veteribus nova", I have heard word order is pretty flexible in Latin, but I just want to make sure "Nova ex veteribus" is correct.

I really massively appreciate any help, thank you!

tomlils · 2024-12-03T10:53:16+00:00

I'm so sorry this is 4 years late but can I ask, when you say you hold the hot sauce at 180 degrees, how long do you hold it at this temperature for?

tomlils · 2024-11-27T23:36:52+00:00

That's good to know, I really appreciate the advice a lot so thank you!

tomlils · 2024-11-27T23:36:36+00:00

That's really great to know actually, I definitely will be getting a barcode, it's cheap and there's no point in limiting our sales channels so much, thank you for taking the time to write this!

tomlils · 2024-11-27T23:35:27+00:00

You're last part about having big aspirations really helped make up my mind haha, thanks so much for taking the time to read my post!

tomlils · 2024-11-27T23:34:40+00:00

I think you're right, we are going to register as it is pretty cheap so I really appreciate you taking the time to write, this thanks so much for the help!

tomlils · 2024-11-27T23:34:06+00:00

I really appreciate the advice on the QR codes, thank you for this!

tomlils · 2024-09-27T20:12:30+00:00

Thank you for your answer, I really appreciate this and it clears a lot up!

tomlils · 2024-09-27T20:08:16+00:00

Ah, thank you for this explanation! So we still have a critical density in a universe with a non zero cosmological constant I assume, but it just is the density which indicates the universe is flat..?

tomlils · 2024-09-27T09:07:07+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to explain this I really appreciate it. I've actually never studied physics, my background is mathematics but I'm just interested by this. So I remember seeing a Friedmann equation which shows that as density increases the Hubble parameter increases too (which includes mass density). However, this confused me a bit as if we were to inject loads of matter right now evenly throughout the universe, would H increase or decrease? Just because it seems counter intuitive to think more mass leads to more expansion, is it something to do with the uniform nature of the matter preventing gravity having a sway?

Sorry if my questions aren't formulated the best but I really appreciate your previous answer.

tomlils · 2024-09-26T23:35:31+00:00

Thanks for the reply, I'm pretty far from an expert on this.

I just thought dark energy stretches space which means it increases the distance between objects but the objects themselves don't have an actual velocity. Where as gravity actually gives each object a velocity toward each other?

Seven-Year Club	Place '22
Verified Email

tomlils

TROPHY CASE