Factory Overhead Allocation Method

The current cost system allocates overhead costs once a year, as a function of direct labor dollars. This allocation strategy results in:

Overhead costs are not in proportion to the production output because of the method they are using. This leads to inaccurate pricing and costing decisions. An Activity Based Costing System would help find the real relationship between the products produced and overhead.

choose the most appropriate and effective overhead rate, particularly, because it guides management in its tasks of product pricing, job costing, and budgeting. Businesses can use the single company-wide method or can opt for the departmental method. Auerbach

14. A decision to work closely with a limited number of suppliers for the purpose of ensuring that the proper materials are available at the optimal time is an example of:

if overapplied overhead is closed out to cost of goods sold will cost of goods sold be increased or decreased

5. Regardless of the allocation system used, the total net income for the year will not change because the overall manufacturing overhead cost does not change. However, it is important to use a more accurate allocation method because it allows company’s to make decisions based on specific areas that might be driving costs up that may not show up when costs are allocated based on one driver.

“Auerbach Enterprises uses machine hours as the cost driver to assign overhead costs to the air conditioners. The company has used a company-wide predetermined overhead rate in past years, but the new controller, Bennie Leon, is considering the use of departmental overhead rates beginning with the next year. “(Schneider, 2012). One product is affected more than the other by use of departmental rates rather than companywide rate.

Abby could allocate indirect costs to special orders using a company-wide overhead rate. Frequently, these indirect costs are allocated by selecting an allocation base common to all of the company’s products or services. Many companies base overhead allocations on direct labor-hours

Under a traditional system, overhead cost is allocated to an activity based on hours or rates for direct labor or machine usage. However, this approach does not clearly indicate how much overhead cost will be needed in order to complete a job through a particular function. ABC methodology is to be used as an alternative to traditional accounting where a business 's overhead costs (indirect costs such as electrical energy consumption for heating or cooling, or indirect cost associated with marketing) are allocated as a proportion of direct costs, to an activity. This approach is unsatisfactory because there can be cases where two activities could absorb the same direct costs

According to this method, every unit of the product is assigned all direct, fixed, and variable costs. This method includes the cost of direct materials and labor as well as a portion of the overhead costs associated with it in the final costing of every unit of the product.

Under the existing cost system for the turning machine area, there are two direct costs and three cost pools for overhead costs. The two direct costs are simply Direct Labor and Direct Material, which are traced to the cost object, which is Machine Parts. The total overhead is split into three cost pools, which are the following: overhead applied on direct labor, overhead applied on material dollars, and overhead applied on ACTS machine hours. Furthermore, each cost pool is broken down into direct and period sub categories. The mentioned cost pools for the following cost drivers: Direct Labor dollars, Material dollars, and machine hours.

1. Use the Overhead Cost Activity Analysis in Exhibit 5 and other data on manufacturing

Allocating overhead costs is one of the important tasks and is necessary to be done by management accountant. One key reason is that in term of pricing strategies, many firms decide their products’ selling price based on their cost. And the selling price has to cover all the costs and profit.

The predetermined overhead rate is used for estimating the manufacturing overhead cost because companies cannot assign the actual overhead cost to specific job. From the case, Wall Décor uses a traditional job-order costing system. The actual costs of direct materials and direct labor are charged to its specific jobs which are unframed prints, steel-framed with no matting prints, and wood-framed with matting prints.

The current method of apportioning production overheads based on direct labour hours can be described as a traditional approach to product costing. In a manufacturing company’s financial statements, each item produced must be allocated some of the production overheads to make the statements compliant. Sometimes the individual costs of these items can be calculated incorrectly based on overall production overhead and the system of allocating in place, however the overall financial statement can still be accurate. This traditional method of allocating the production