Charley,
At the risk of reiterating what TooHot To Fly has said, the Perf A exam is for people doing the old CAA exams only.
If you're doing the JAR exams, it is covered on the generic 'Performance' exam. You will do this at groundschool along with the other 13 ATPL subjects. You will not need to budget for this as a seperate item.
A little bit of good news I hope
[This message has been edited by foghorn (edited 23 January 2001).]