Okay. I have a solution for this. It turns out that when EJBs applications are deployed, the properties in ejb3-interceptors-aop.xml file under the deploy directory are applied first. The following annotation in the file says "if the class is not present then apply this property. | <annotation expr="class(*) AND !class((a)org.jboss.ejb3.annotation.Pool)&quot;&gt; | @org.jboss.ejb3.annotation.Pool (value="ThreadlocalPool", maxSize=20, timeout=10000) | </annotation> | So, when I was bundling my -aop.xml file with my EJB application, the property should read: | <annotation expr=&quot;class((a)org.jboss.ejb3.annotation.Pool)&quot;&gt; | @org.jboss.ejb3.annotation.Pool (value="StrictMaxPool", maxSize=10, timeout=10000) | </annotation> | Which means, if the class is present then apply this property. As the properties from ejb3-interceptors-aop.xml file are always applied first, the class is present and therefore we only check for its existence. Most of the documentation is misleading in a way that this point is not very clear. Thanks, Shreyas View the original post : http://www.jboss.org/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4266942#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.org/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...