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a2 sequence math question

A salesman is paid commission of £10 per week for each life insurance policy that he has sold. Each week he sells one new policy so that he is paid £10 commission in the first week, £20 commission in the second week, £30 commission in the third week and so on.

i don't get it, it thought he sold 1 life insurance per week so he would earn 10 pounds, why is he earning 10 pounds more every week?

Reply 1

ghostwalker

Original post by interlanken-fall

He gets £10 per week for each policy sold, and sells one new policy per week.

So, first week he sells 1 policy and gets £10.

Second week he sells another policy and gets £10 for that, plus £10 for the policy he sold in the first week. Total in second week, £20.

Third week he sells another, and gets £10 for that, plus £10 for the one he sold in the second week, plus £10 for the one he sold in the first week. Total in third week, £30.

Etc.

PS: Politics forum probably isn't the best place for this thread.

Reply 2

interlanken-fall

Original post by ghostwalker

thanks, i tried to make it to the math formun but it wouldn't let me, I'm stuck on the last question here
A salesman is paid commission of £10 per week for each life insurance policy that he has sold. Each week he sells one new policy so that he is paid £10 commission in the first week, £20 commission in the second week, £30 commission in the third week and so on.

a) Find his total commission in the first year of 52 weeks: I got £13780 which is correct.

b) In the second year the commission increases to £11 per week on new policies sold, although it remains at £10 per week for policies sold in the first year. He continues to sell one policy per week. Show that he is paid £542 in the second week of his second year. 520 + 22 = 542

c) Find the total commission paid to him in the second year:

stuck on C

Reply 3

interlanken-fall

Original post by ghostwalker

what i dont get is that for question A
Find his total commission in the first year of 52 weeks.
shouldt it be 52 times 10?
why is it 542, unless he gets 10 first week and gets 20 the next week which all add up?
if that's the case then why for question B do they do 520 times 52? + yr 2 comissions
if the total commission for yr 1 is 13 780 (answer) then why don't they do that's times 52?

Reply 4

ghostwalker

Original post by interlanken-fall

what i dont get is that for question A
Find his total commission in the first year of 52 weeks.
shouldt it be 52 times 10?

You seem rather confused. You've already shown that it's not 52 x 10, since the commission each week goes up by £10 - it's not constant.

why is it 542, unless he gets 10 first week and gets 20 the next week which all add up?

For the 2nd week in the 2nd year you're only looking at commission for that week, so you won't be adding all the weeks before hand.

if that's the case then why for question B do they do 520 times 52? + yr 2 comissions

That doesn't make sense. I presume you meant 52 x 10 + yr2.

In the first year he sold 52 policies, so the commission on them in the 2nd week of yr2 will be 52 x 10.
So far, in the 2nd year he's sold 2 new policies, so the commission on them is 2 x 11 = 22.

Hence 520 + 22 = 542

if the total commission for yr 1 is 13 780 (answer) then why don't they do that's times 52?

If this is part B again, then what would that give you? What does it mean to multiply the total commission in one year by the number of weeks in a year?

For part C:

Total commission in the second year will be the sum of the the commissions due to the policies in the first year + the commission due to the policies in the 2nd year.