Practical and Written Assessment -
Assignment questions
Baulkham Hills Shire Council owns and operates an animal shelter that performs three services: housing and finding homes for stray and unwanted animals, providing health care and nurturing services for the animals, and pet training services. One facility is dedicated to housing animals waiting to be adopted. A second facility houses veterinarian services. A third facility houses the director, his staff, and several dog trainers. This facility also has several large meeting rooms that are frequently used for classes given by the animal trainers. The trainers work with all of the animals to ensure that they are relatively easy to manage. They also provide dog obedience classes for adopting families. Estimated annual costs for the animal shelter and its services are as follows:
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Director and staff salaries
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$60,000
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Animal shelter employees' salaries
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100,000
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Veterinarians and technicians
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150,000
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Animal trainers
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40,000
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Food and supplies
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125,000
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Building-related costs
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200,000
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On average, 75 animals per day are housed at the facility, or about 27375 (75 x 365) animal days in total. The number of animals housed during the year totalled 4500. In addition, the trainers offer about 125 classes during the year, i.e., about 30 weeks throughout the year. On average, 10 families attend each class. Last year the veterinarian clinic experienced 5000 animal visits.
You have been newly appointed as one of the Director's staff members and have been asked to set up an ABC system for the shelter so that the Director can better understand the cost for each of the shelter's services. You gather the following information:
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Square footage for each facility:
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Animal shelter
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5000 square feet
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Director and training
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3000 square feet
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Veterinarian clinic
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2000 square feet
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Percentage of trainer time used in classes
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50%
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Supplies used for veterinarian services
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$75,000
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REQUIRED: Prepare an Executive Report to advise the Director on the results of an analysis of the costing system and the introduction of an ABC system. Your report should include the following:
1. Show how you identified cost pools and assigned costs to them, considering the three cost objects of interest.
2. How did you determine a cost driver for each cost pool and explain your choice.
3. Calculate the allocation rates for each cost pool and cost driver. Interpret the allocation rate for each cost pool (i.e., explain what it means).