HORNGRENS COST ACCOUNTING W/ACCESS
HORNGRENS COST ACCOUNTING W/ACCESS
16th Edition
ISBN: 9781323687604
Author: Datar
Publisher: PEARSON
bartleby

Videos

Textbook Question
Chapter 1, Problem 1.26E

Professional ethics and reporting division performance. Maria Mendez is division controller and James Dalton is division manager of the Hestor Shoe Company. Mendez has line responsibility to Dalton, but she also has staff responsibility to the company controller.

Dalton is under severe pressure to achieve the budgeted division income for the year. He has asked Mendez to book $200,000 of revenues on December 31. The customers’ orders are firm, but the shoes are still in the production process. They will be shipped on or around January 4. Dalton says to Mendez. “The key event is getting the sales order, not shipping the shoes. You should support me, not obstruct my reaching division goals.”

  1. 1. Describe Mendez’s ethical responsibilities.
Blurred answer
Students have asked these similar questions
Professional ethics and reporting division performance.  Maria Mendez is division controller and James Dalton is division manager of the Hestor Shoe Company. Mendez has line responsibility to Dalton, but she also has staff responsibility to the company controller. Dalton is under severe pressure to achieve the budgeted division income for the year. He has asked Mendez to book $200,000 of revenues on December 31. The customers’ orders are firm, but the shoes are still in the production process. They will be shipped on or around January 4. Dalton says to Mendez, “The key event is getting the sales order, not shipping the shoes. You should support me, not obstruct my reaching division goals.” Describe Mendez’s ethical responsibilities. What should Mendez do if Dalton gives her a direct order to book the sales?
Maria Mendez is division controller andJames Dalton is division manager of the Hestor Shoe Company. Mendez has line responsibility to Dalton,but she also has staff responsibility to the company controller.Dalton is under severe pressure to achieve the budgeted division income for the year. He has askedMendez to book $200,000 of revenues on December 31. The customers’ orders are firm, but the shoes arestill in the production process. They will be shipped on or around January 4. Dalton says to Mendez, “Thekey event is getting the sales order, not shipping the shoes. You should support me, not obstruct my reachingdivision goals.” What should Mendez do if Dalton gives her a direct order to book the sales?
Maria Mendez is division controller andJames Dalton is division manager of the Hestor Shoe Company. Mendez has line responsibility to Dalton,but she also has staff responsibility to the company controller.Dalton is under severe pressure to achieve the budgeted division income for the year. He has askedMendez to book $200,000 of revenues on December 31. The customers’ orders are firm, but the shoes arestill in the production process. They will be shipped on or around January 4. Dalton says to Mendez, “Thekey event is getting the sales order, not shipping the shoes. You should support me, not obstruct my reachingdivision goals.” Describe Mendez’s ethical responsibilities.

Chapter 1 Solutions

HORNGRENS COST ACCOUNTING W/ACCESS

Knowledge Booster
Accounting
Learn more about
Need a deep-dive on the concept behind this application? Look no further. Learn more about this topic, accounting and related others by exploring similar questions and additional content below.
Similar questions
  • Bill Fremont, division controller and CMA, was upset by a recent memo he received from the divisional manager, Steve Preston. Bill was scheduled to present the divisions financial performance at headquarters in one week. In the memo, Steve had given Bill some instructions for this upcoming report. In particular, Bill had been told to emphasize the significant improvement in the divisions profits over last year. Bill, however, didnt believe that there was any real underlying improvement in the divisions performance and was reluctant to say otherwise. He knew that the increase in profits was because of Steves conscious decision to produce more inventory. In an earlier meeting, Steve had convinced his plant managers to produce more than they knew they could sell. He argued that by deferring some of this periods fixed costs, reported profits would jump. He pointed out two significant benefits. First, by increasing profits, the division could exceed the minimum level needed so that all the managers would qualify for the annual bonus. Second, by meeting the budgeted profit level, the division would be better able to compete for much-needed capital. Bill objected but had been overruled. The most persuasive counterargument was that the increase in inventory could be liquidated in the coming year as the economy improved. Bill, however, considered this event unlikely. From past experience, he knew that it would take at least two years of improved market demand before the productive capacity of the division was exceeded. Required: 1. Discuss the behavior of Steve Preston, the divisional manager. Was the decision to produce for inventory an ethical one? 2. What should Bill Fremont do? Should he comply with the directive to emphasize the increase in profits? If not, what options does he have? 3. Chapter 1 listed ethical standards for management accountants. Identify any standards that apply in this situation.
    Kelly Gray, production manager, was upset with the latest performance report, which indicated that she was 100,000 over budget. Given the efforts that she and her workers had made, she was confident that they had met or beat the budget. Now, she was not only upset but also genuinely puzzled over the results. Three itemsdirect labor, power, and setupswere over budget. The actual costs for these three items follow: Kelly knew that her operation had produced more units than originally had been budgeted, so more power and labor had naturally been used. She also knew that the uncertainty in scheduling had led to more setups than planned. When she pointed this out to John Huang, the controller, he assured her that the budgeted costs had been adjusted for the increase in productive activity. Curious, Kelly questioned John about the methods used to make the adjustment. JOHN: If the actual level of activity differs from the original planned level, we adjust the budget by using budget formulasformulas that allow us to predict what the costs will be for different levels of activity. KELLY: The approach sounds reasonable. However, Im sure something is wrong here. Tell me exactly how you adjusted the costs of labor, power, and setups. JOHN: First, we obtain formulas for the individual items in the budget by using the method of least squares. We assume that cost variations can be explained by variations in productive activity where activity is measured by direct labor hours. Here is a list of the cost formulas for the three items you mentioned. The variable X is the number of direct labor hours: Labor cost = 10X Power cost = 5,000 + 4X Setup cost = 100,000 KELLY: I think I see the problem. Power costs dont have a lot to do with direct labor hours. They have more to do with machine hours. As production increases, machine hours increase more rapidly than direct labor hours. Also, ... JOHN: You know, you have a point. The coefficient of determination for power cost is only about 50 percent. That leaves a lot of unexplained cost variation. The coefficient for labor, however, is much betterit explains about 96 percent of the cost variation. Setup costs, of course, are fixed. KELLY: Well, as I was about to say, setup costs also have very little to do with direct labor hours. And I might add that they certainly are not fixedat least not all of them. We had to do more setups than our original plan called for because of the scheduling changes. And we have to pay our people when they work extra hours. It seems as if we are always paying overtime. I wonder if we simply do not have enough people for the setup activity. Supplies are used for each setup, and these are not cheap. Did you build these extra costs of increased setup activity into your budget? JOHN: No, we assumed that setup costs were fixed. I see now that some of them could vary as the number of setups increases. Kelly, let me see if I can develop some cost formulas based on better explanatory variables. Ill get back with you in a few days. Assume that after a few days work, John developed the following cost formulas, all with a coefficient of determination greater than 90 percent: Labor cost = 10X; where X = Direct labor hours Power cost = 68,000 + 0.9Y; where Y = Machine hours Setup cost = 98,000 + 400Z; where Z = Number of setups The actual measures of each of the activity drivers are as follows: Required: 1. Prepare a performance report for direct labor, power, and setups using the direct-labor-based formulas. 2. Prepare a performance report for direct labor, power, and setups using the multiple cost driver formulas that John developed. 3. Of the two approaches, which provides the most accurate picture of Kellys performance? Why? 4. After reviewing the approach to performance measurement, a consultant remarked that non-value-added cost trend reports would be a much better performance measurement approach than comparing actual costs with budgeted costseven if activity flexible budgets were used. Do you agree or disagree? Explain.
    Recently, Ulrich Company received a report from an external consulting group on its quality costs. The consultants reported that the companys quality costs total about 21 percent of its sales revenues. Somewhat shocked by the magnitude of the costs, Rob Rustin, president of Ulrich Company, decided to launch a major quality improvement program. For the coming year, management decided to reduce quality costs to 17 percent of sales revenues. Although the amount of reduction was ambitious, most company officials believed that the goal could be realized. To improve the monitoring of the quality improvement program, Rob directed Pamela Golding, the controller, to prepare monthly performance reports comparing budgeted and actual quality costs. Budgeted costs and sales for the first two months of the year are as follows: The following actual sales and actual quality costs were reported for January: Required: 1. Reorganize the monthly budgets so that quality costs are grouped in one of four categories: appraisal, prevention, internal failure, or external failure. (Essentially, prepare a budgeted cost of quality report.) Also, identify each cost as variable (V) or fixed (F). (Assume that no costs are mixed.) 2. Prepare a performance report for January that compares actual costs with budgeted costs. Comment on the companys progress in improving quality and reducing its quality costs.
  • Greiner Company makes and sells high-quality glare filters for microcomputer monitors. John Craven, controller, is responsible for preparing Greiners master budget and has assembled the following data for the coming year. The direct labor rate includes wages, all employee-related benefits, and the employers share of FICA. Labor saving machinery will be fully operational by March. Also, as of March 1, the companys union contract calls for an increase in direct labor wages that is included in the direct labor rate. Greiner expects to have 5,600 glare filters in inventory on December 31 of the current year, and has a policy of carrying 35 percent of the following month's projected sales in inventory. Information on the first four months of the coming year is as follows: Required: 1. Prepare the following monthly budgets for Greiner Company for the first quarter of the coming year. Be sure to show supporting calculations. a. Production budget in units b. Direct labor budget in hours c. Direct materials cost budget d. Sales budget 2. Calculate the total budgeted contribution margin for Greiner Company by month and in total for the first quarter of the coming year. Be sure to show supporting calculations. (CMA adapted)
    In 20X1, Don Blackburn, president of Price Electronics, received a report indicating that quality costs were 31% of sales. Faced with increasing pressures from imported goods. Don resolved to take measures to improve the overall quality of the companys products. After hiring a consultant in 20X1, the company began an aggressive program of total quality control. At the end of 20X5, Don requested an analysis of the progress the company had made in reducing and controlling quality costs. The accounting department assembled the following data: Required: 1. Compute the quality costs as a percentage of sales by category and in total for each year. 2. Prepare a multiple-year trend graph for quality costs, both by total costs and by category. Using the graph, assess the progress made in reducing and controlling quality costs. Does the graph provide evidence that quality has improved? Explain. 3. Using the 20X1 quality cost relationships (assume all costs are variable), calculate the quality costs that would have prevailed in 20X4. By how much did profits increase in 20X4 because of the quality improvement program? Repeat for 20X5.
    Jane Erickson, manager of an electronics division, was not pleased with the results that had recently been reported concerning the divisions activity-based management implementation project. For one thing, the project had taken eight months longer than projected and had exceeded the budget by nearly 35 percent. But even more vexatious was the fact that after all was said and done, about three-fourths of the plants were reporting that the activity-based product costs were not much different for most of the products than those of the old costing system. Plant managers were indicating that they were continuing to use the old costs as they were easier to compute and understand. Yet, at the same time, they were complaining that they were having a hard time meeting the bids of competitors. Reliable sources were also revealing that the divisions product costs were higher than many competitors. This outcome perplexed plant managers because their control system still continued to report favorable materials and labor efficiency variances. They complained that ABM had failed to produce any significant improvement in cost performance. Jane decided to tour several of the plants and talk with the plant managers. After the tour, she realized that her managers did not understand the concept of non-value-added costs nor did they have a good grasp of the concept of kaizen costing. No efforts were being made to carefully consider the activity information that had been produced. One typical plant manager threw up his hands and said: This is too much data. Why should I care about all this detail? I do not see how this can help me improve my plants performance. They tell me that inspection is not a necessary activity and does not add value. I simply cant believe that inspecting isnt value-added and necessary. If we did not inspect, we would be making and sending more bad products to customers. Required: Explain why Janes division is having problems with its ABM implementation.
  • Tonya Martin, CMA and controller or the Parts Division of Gunderson Inc., was meeting with Doug Adams, manager of the division. The topic of discussion was the assignment of overhead costs to jobs and their impact on the divisions pricing decisions. Their conversation was as follows: Tonya: Doug, as you know, about 25% of our business is based on government contracts, with the other 75% based on jobs from private sources won through bidding. During the last several years, our private business has declined. We have been losing more bids than usual. After some careful investigation, I have concluded that we are overpricing some jobs because of improper assignment of overhead costs. Some jobs are also being underpriced. Unfortunately, the jobs being overpriced are coming from our higher-volume, labor-intensive products, so we are losing business. Dong: I think I understand. Jobs associated with our high-volume products are being assigned more overhead than they should be receiving. Then when we add our standard 40% markup, we end up with a higher price than our competitors, who assign costs more accurately. Tonya: Exactly. We have two producing departments, one labor-intensive and the other machine-intensive. The labor-intensive department generates much less overhead than the machine-intensive department. Furthermore, virtually all of our high-volume jobs are labor-intensive. We have been using a plantwide rate based on direct labor hours to assign overhead to all jobs. As a result, the high-volume, labor-intensive jobs receive a greater share of the machine-intensive departments overhead than they deserve. This problem can be greatly alleviated by switching to departmental overhead rates. For example, an average high-volume job would be assigned 100,000 of overhead using a plantwide rate and only 70,000 using departmental rates. The change would lower our bidding price on high-volume jobs by an average of 42,000 per job. By increasing the accuracy of our product costing, we can make better pricing decisions and win back much of our private-sector business. Doug: Sounds good. When can you implement the change in overhead rates? Tonya: It wont take long. I can have the new system working within four to six weekscertainly by the start of the new fiscal year. Doug: Hold it. I just thought of a possible complication. As I recall, most of our government contract work is done in the labor-intensive department. This new overhead assignment scheme will push down the cost on the government jobs, and we will lose revenues. They pay us full cost plus our standard markup. This business is not threatened by our current costing procedures, but we cant switch our rates for only the private business. Government auditors would question the lack of consistency in our costing procedures. Tonya: You do have a point. I thought of this issue also. According to my estimates, we will gain more revenues from the private sector than we will lose from our government contracts. Besides, the costs of our government jobs are distorted. In effect, we are overcharging the government. Doug: They dont know that and never would unless we switch our overhead assignment procedures. I think I have the solution. Officially, lets keep our plantwide overhead rate. All of the official records will reflect this overhead costing approach for both our private and government business. Unofficially. I want you to develop a separate set of books that can be used to generate the information we need to prepare competitive bids for our private-sector business. Required: 1. Do you believe that the solution proposed by Doug is ethical? Explain. 2. Suppose that Tonya decides that Dougs solution is not right and objects strongly. Further suppose that, despite Tonyas objections, Doug insists strongly on implementing the action. What should Tonya do?
    Suppose that Kicker had the following sales and cost experience (in thousands of dollars) for May of the current year and for May of the prior year: In May of the prior year, Kicker started an intensive quality program designed to enable it to build original equipment manufacture (OEM) speaker systems for a major automobile company. The program was housed in research and development. In the beginning of the current year, Kickers accounting department exercised tighter control over sales commissions, ensuring that no dubious (e.g., double) payments were made. The increased sales in the current year required additional warehouse space that Kicker rented in town. (Round ratios to four decimal places. Round sales dollars computations to the nearest dollar.) Required: 1. Calculate the contribution margin ratio for May of both years. 2. Calculate the break-even point in sales dollars for both years. 3. Calculate the margin of safety in sales dollars for both years. 4. CONCEPTUAL CONNECTION Analyze the differences shown by your calculations in Requirements 1, 2, and 3.
    Analysis of costs for a shipping department Sales volume has been dropping at Mumford Industries. During this time, the Shipping Department manager has been under severe financial constraints. Most of the Shipping Departments efforts are related to pulling inventory from the warehouse for each order and performing the paperwork. The paperwork involves preparing shipping documents for each order. Thus, the pulling and paperwork effort associated with each sales order is essentially the same, regardless of the size of the order. The Shipping Department manager has discussed the financial situation with senior management. Senior management has responded by pointing out that because sales volume has been dropping, the amount of work in the Shipping Department also should be dropping. Thus, senior management told the Shipping Department manager that costs should be decreasing in the department. The Shipping Department manager prepared the following information: Given this information, how would you respond to senior management?
  • GHT Tech Inc. sells electronics over the Internet. The Consumer Products Division is organized as a cost center. The budget for the Consumer Products Division for the month ended January 31 is as follows: During January, the costs incurred in the Consumer Products Division were as follows: Instructions 1. Prepare a budget performance report for the director of the Consumer Products Division for the month of January. 2. For which costs might the director be expected to request supplemental reports?
    Each of the following scenarios requires the use of accounting information to carry out one or more of the following managerial activities: (1) planning, (2) control and evaluation, (3) continuous improvement, or (4) decision making. a. MANAGER: At the last board meeting, we established an objective of earning an after-tax profit equal to 20 percent of sales. I need to know the revenue that we need to earn in order to meet this objective, given that we have 250,000 to spend on the promotional campaign. Once I have estimated sales in units, we then need to outline a promotional campaign that conforms to our budget and that will take us where we want to be. However, to compute the targeted sales revenue, I need to know the unit sales price, the unit variable cost, and the associated fixed production and support costs. I also need to know the tax rate. b. MANAGER: We have problems with our procurement process. Our accounts payable department is spending 80 percent of its time resolving discrepancies between the purchase order, receiving order, and suppliers invoice. Incorrect part numbers on the purchase orders, incorrect quantities ordered, and wrong parts sent (or the incorrect quantity) are just a few examples of sources of discrepancies. A complete redesign of the process has been suggested, which will allow us to eliminate virtually all of the errors and, at the same time, significantly reduce the number of clerks needed in purchasing, receiving, and accounts payable. This redesign promises to significantly reduce costs, decrease lead time, and increase customer satisfaction. c. MANAGER: This overhead cost report indicates that we have spent significantly more on inspection, purchasing, and production than was budgeted. An investigation has revealed that the source of the problem is faulty components from suppliers. A supplier evaluation has revealed that by selecting five suppliers with the best quality records (out of 15 currently used), the number of defective components will be dramatically reduced, thus producing significant overhead savings by reducing the demand for inspections, reordering, and rework. d. MANAGER: A large local firm has approached me and has offered to sell us one of the components used in our small enginesa component that we are currently producing internally. I need to know costs that we would avoid if this component is purchased so that I can assess the economic merits of this offer. e. MANAGER: Currently, our deluxe lawn mower is losing money. We need to increase profits. I would like to know how much our profits would be if we reduce our variable costs by 50 per mower while maintaining our current sales volume. Also, marketing claims that if we increase advertising expenditures by 1,000,000 and cut prices by 15 percent, we can increase the number of mowers sold by 25 percent. I would like to know which approach offers the most profit, or if a combination of the approaches may be best. f. MANAGER: We are implementing a major quality improvement program. We will be increasing the investment in prevention and detection activities with the expectation of driving down both internal and external failure costs. I expect to see trend reports for all categories of quality costs. I want to see if improving quality really does reduce costs and improve profitability. g. MANAGER: Our engineering design department has proposed a new design for our product. The new design promises to reduce post-purchase costs and, as a consequence, increase market share. I need to know the cost of producing this new design because it uses some new components and requires some different manufacturing processes. I would then like to have a projected income statement based on the new market share and new production costs. The planned selling price will be the same, or maybe even 10 percent lower. Projections based on the two price scenarios would be needed. h. MANAGER: My engineers have said that by redesigning our two main production processes, we can reduce move time by 90 percent and wait time by 85 percent. This would decrease cycle time and virtually eliminate the need to carry finished goods inventories. On-time deliveries would also increase dramatically. This would produce cost savings of nearly 20,000,000 per year. Market share and revenues would also increase. Required: 1. Describe each of the four managerial responsibilities. 2. Identify the managerial activity or activities applicable for each scenario, and indicate the role of accounting information in the activity.
    Professional ethics and reporting division performance.  Hannah Gilpin is the controller of Blakemore Auto Glass, a division of Eastern Glass and Window. Blakemore replaces and installs windshields.  Her division has been under pressure to improve its divisional operating income. Currently, divisions of Eastern Glass are allocated corporate overhead based on cost of goods sold. Jake Myers,  the president of the division, has asked Gilpin to reclassify $50,000 of installation labor, which is included in cost of goods sold, as administrative labor, which is not. Doing so will save the division $20,000 in allocated corporate overhead. The labor costs in question involve installation labor provided by trainee employees. Myers argues, “the trainees are not as efficient as regular employees so this is unfairly inflating our cost of goods sold. This is really a cost of training (administrative labor) not part of cost of goods sold.” Gilpin does not see a reason for reclassification of the…
    • SEE MORE QUESTIONS
    Recommended textbooks for you
  • Managerial Accounting: The Cornerstone of Busines...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337115773
    Author:Maryanne M. Mowen, Don R. Hansen, Dan L. Heitger
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
    Financial And Managerial Accounting
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337902663
    Author:WARREN, Carl S.
    Publisher:Cengage Learning,
    Managerial Accounting
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337912020
    Author:Carl Warren, Ph.d. Cma William B. Tayler
    Publisher:South-Western College Pub
  • Cornerstones of Cost Management (Cornerstones Ser...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781305970663
    Author:Don R. Hansen, Maryanne M. Mowen
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
    Auditing: A Risk Based-Approach (MindTap Course L...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337619455
    Author:Karla M Johnstone, Audrey A. Gramling, Larry E. Rittenberg
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
  • Managerial Accounting: The Cornerstone of Busines...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337115773
    Author:Maryanne M. Mowen, Don R. Hansen, Dan L. Heitger
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
    Financial And Managerial Accounting
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337902663
    Author:WARREN, Carl S.
    Publisher:Cengage Learning,
    Managerial Accounting
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337912020
    Author:Carl Warren, Ph.d. Cma William B. Tayler
    Publisher:South-Western College Pub
    Cornerstones of Cost Management (Cornerstones Ser...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781305970663
    Author:Don R. Hansen, Maryanne M. Mowen
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
    Auditing: A Risk Based-Approach (MindTap Course L...
    Accounting
    ISBN:9781337619455
    Author:Karla M Johnstone, Audrey A. Gramling, Larry E. Rittenberg
    Publisher:Cengage Learning
    HR Basics: Compensation; Author: HR Basics: Compensation;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZoRId6ADuo;License: Standard Youtube License