题目

 Explain what is meant by the principle of controllability. 

考点:Chapter10Budgetingandstandardcosting

The principle of controllability is that managers of responsibility centres should only be held accountable for costs over which they have some influence.  

Budgetary control is based around a system of budget centres. Each budget centre will have its own budget and a manager will be responsible for managing the budget centre and ensuring that the budget is met. 

Budgetary control and budget centres are therefore part of the overall system of responsibility accounting within an organisation. 

Controllable costs are items of expenditure which can be directly influenced by a given manager within a given time span.  

Care must be taken to distinguish between controllable costs and uncontrollable costs in variance reporting. The controllability principle is that managers of responsibility centres should only be held accountable for costs over which they have some influence. From a motivation point of view this is important because it can be very demoralising for managers who feel that their performance is being judged on the basis of something over which they have no influence. It is also important from a control point of view in that control reports should ensure that information on costs is reported to the manager who is able to take action to control them. 

Responsibility accounting attempts to associate costs, revenues, assets and liabilities with the managers most capable of controlling them. As a system of accounting, it therefore distinguishes between controllable and uncontrollable costs. 

Most variable costs within a department are thought to be controllable in the short term because managers can influence the efficiency with which resources are used, even if they cannot do anything to raise or lower price levels. 

A cost which is not controllable by a junior manager might be controllable by a senior manager. For example, there may be high direct labour costs in a department caused by excessive overtime working. The junior manager may feel obliged to continue with the overtime to meet production schedules, but his senior may be able to reduce costs by hiring extra full-time staff, thereby reducing the requirements for overtime. 

A cost which is not controllable by a manager in one department may be controllable by a manager in another department. For example, an increase in material costs may be caused by buying at higher prices than expected (controllable by the purchasing department) or by excessive wastage (controllable by the production department) or by a faulty machine producing rejects (controllable by the maintenance department). 

Some costs are non-controllable, such as increases in expenditure items due to inflation. Other costs are controllable, but in the long term rather than the short term. For example, production costs might be reduced by the introduction of new machinery and technology, but in the short term, management must attempt to do the best they can with the resources and machinery at their disposal. 

多做几道

 A public health clinic is the subject of a scheme to measure its efficiency and effectiveness. Among a number of factors, the 'quality of care provided' has been included as an aspect of the clinic's service to be measured. Three features of 'quality of care provided' have been listed. 

(1) Clinic's adherence to appointment times 

(2) Patients' ability to contact the clinic and make appointments without difficulty 

(3) The provision of a comprehensive patient health monitoring programme 

Required

 (i) Suggest a set of quantitative measures which can be used to identify the effective level of achievement of each of the features listed.

(ii) Indicate how these measures could be combined into a single 'quality of care' measure. 

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18

【论述题】

The absence of the profit measure in non profit seeking organisations causes problems for the measurement of their efficiency and effectiveness. 

Required 

(i) Explain why the absence of the profit measure should be a cause of the problems referred to.

(ii) Explain how these problems extend to activities within business entities which have a profit motive. Support your answer with examples. 

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24

【论述题】

Compare and contrast the use of residual income and return on investment in divisionalperformance measurement, stating the advantages and disadvantages of each. 

 Division Y of Chardonnay currently has capital employed of $100,000 and earns an annual profit after depreciation of $18,000. The divisional manager is considering an investment of $10,000 in an asset which will have a ten-year life with no residual value and will earn a constant annual profit after depreciation of $1,600. The cost of capital is 15%. 

Calculate the following and comment on the results. 

(i) The return on divisional investment before and after the new investment 

(ii) The divisional residual income before and after the new investment 

 Explain the potential benefits of operating a transfer pricing system within a divisionalised company. 

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