TP makes wedding cakes that are sold to specialist retail outlets which decorate the cakes according to the customers' specific requirements. The standard cost per unit of its most popular cake is as follows:

The general market prices at the time of purchase for Ingredient A and Ingredient B were $23 per kg and $20 per kg respectively. TP operates a JIT purchasing system for ingredients and a JIT production system; therefore, there was no inventory during the period.
What was the material yield variance?

• A. The material yield variance was $175 000 A
• B. The material yield variance was $175 500 A
• C. The material yield variance was $155 000 A
• D. The material yield variance was $98 500 A
• E. The material yield variance was $155 500 A

RT produces two products from different quantities of the same resources using a just-in-time (JIT) production system. The selling price and resource requirements of each of the products are shown below:

Market research shows that the maximum demand for products R and T during June 2010 is 500 units and
800 units respectively. This does not include an order that RT has agreed with a commercial customer for the supply of 250 units of R and 350 units of T at selling prices of $100 and $135 per unit respectively. Although the customer will accept part of the order, failure by RT to deliver the order in full by the end of June will cause RT to incur a $10,000 financial penalty. At a recent meeting of the purchasing and production managers to discuss the production plans of RT for June, the following resource restrictions for June were identified:
Direct labour hours 7,500 hours
Material A 8,500 kgs
Material B 3,000 litres
Machine hours 7,500 hours
Assuming that RT completes the order with the commercial customer, prepare calculations to show, from a financial perspective, the optimum production plan for June 2010 and the contribution that would result from adopting this plan.
The contribution per unit for R and T will be...?

• A. R = $47 per unit. T = $65 per unit
• B. R = $47 per unit. T = $61 per unit
• C. R = $45 per unit. T = $66 per unit
• D. R = $51 per unit. T = $61 per unit

A medium-sized manufacturing company, which operates in the electronics industry, has employed a firm of consultants to carry out a review of the company's planning and control systems. The company presently uses a traditional incremental budgeting system and the inventory management system is based on economic order quantities (EOQ) and reorder levels. The company's normal production patterns have changed significantly over the previous few years as a result of increasing demand for customized products. This has resulted in shorter production runs and difficulties with production and resource planning.
The consultants have recommended the implementation of activity based budgeting and a manufacturing resource planning system to improve planning and resource management.
How will a manufacturing resource planning system improve the planning of purchases and production for the company?
Select ALL the correct answers.

• A. A manufacturing resource planning approach to the management of all the company's manufacturing
  resources including inventory, labour and machine capacity.
• B. It seeks to ensure that resources are available just before they are needed by the next stage of production or dispatch. It also seeks to ensure that resources are delivered only when required so that raw material inventory is kept to a minimum.
• C. The correct inventory management system relies on the assumption that there is constant demand. An MRP system begins with the setting of a master production schedule specifying both the timing and quantity demanded of each of the finished goods items and then works backwards to determine the resource requirements at each stage of the production process.
• D. The technique will not enable managers to track orders through the manufacturing process and will not assist the purchasing and production control departments to move the right amount of material or sub- assemblies at the right time to the right place.
• E. It aims to generate an estimation of materials requirements after taking account of the number of employees quality and waste. The TQS model can be used within MRP provided that the major assumption in the TQS model of constant demand applies.
• F. The traditional approach to determine material requirements is to monitor inventories constantly; whenever they fall to a predetermined level, a preset order is placed to replenish them. This traditional approach (involving re-order levels and economic order quantity calculations originates in the pre-computer era.

RFT, an engineering company, has been asked to provide a quotation for a contract to build a new engine.
The potential customer is not a current customer of RFT, but the directors of RFT are keen to try and win the contract as they believe that this may lead to more contracts in the future. As a result, they intend pricing the contract using relevant costs. The following information has been obtained from a two-hour meeting that the Production Director of RFT had with the potential customer. The Production Director is paid an annual salary equivalent to $1,200 per 8-hour day. 110 square meters of material A will be required. This is a material that is regularly used by RFT and there are 200 square meters currently in inventory. These were bought at a cost of
$12 per square meter. They have a resale value of $10.50 per square meter and their current replacement cost is $12.50 per square meter. 30 liters of material B will be required. This material will have to be purchased for the contract because it is not otherwise used by RFT. The minimum order quantity from the supplier is 40 liters at a cost of $9 per liter. RFT does not expect to have any use for any of this material that remains after this contract is completed. 60 components will be required. These will be purchased from HY. The purchase price is $50 per component. A total of 235 direct labour hours will be required. The current wage rate for the appropriate grade of direct labour is $11 per hour. Currently RFT has 75 direct labour hours of spare capacity at this grade that is being paid under a guaranteed wage agreement. The additional hours would need to be obtained by either (i) overtime at a total cost of $14 per hour; or (ii) recruiting temporary staff at a cost of $12 per hour. However, if temporary staff are used they will not be as experienced as RFT's existing workers and will require 10 hours supervision by an existing supervisor who would be paid overtime at a cost of $18 per hour for this work. 25 machine hours will be required. The machine to be used is already leased for a weekly leasing cost of $600. It has a capacity of 40 hours per week. The machine has sufficient available capacity for the contract to be completed. The variable running cost of the machine is $7 per hour. The company absorbs its fixed overhead costs using an absorption rate of $20 per direct labour hour.
Select ALL the true statements.

• A. Material A was a relevant cost.
• B. The machine is currently being leased and it has spare capacity so it will either stand idle or be used on this work. The lease cost will be a relevant cost or $10 per hour.
• C. The relevant cost is $7080
• D. The components are to be purchased from HY at a cost of $50 each. This is a relevant cost because it is future expenditure that will be incurred as a result of the work being undertaken.
• E. Material B was a relevant cost.
• F. The relevant cost is $7100
• G. The cost for the production director meeting was a relevant cost.
• H. The relevant cost is $7010
• I. The company absorbs its fixed overhead costs using an absorption rate of $20 per direct labour hour. This is a relevant cost.

A major company sells a range of electrical, clothing and homeware products through a chain of department stores. The main administration functions are provided from the company's head office. Each department store has its own warehouse which receives goods that are delivered from a central distribution center.
The company currently measures profitability by product group for each store using an absorption costing system. All overhead costs are charged to product groups based on sales revenue. Overhead costs account for approximately one-third of total costs and the directors are concerned about the arbitrary nature of the current method used to charge these costs to product groups.
A consultant has been appointed to analyses the activities that are undertaken in the department stores and to establish an activity based costing system.
The consultant has identified the following data for the latest period for each of the product groups for the X Town store:

Calculate the total profit for each of the product groups:
.... using the current absorption costing system;

• A. The profit or loss in $ was.... Clothing 85; Electrical 36; Homeware (28)
• B. The profit or loss in $ was.... Clothing (175); Electrical 86; Homeware 22
• C. The profit or loss in $ was.... Clothing 122; Electrical 56; Homeware (178)
• D. The profit or loss in $ was.... Clothing 192; Electrical (56); Homeware 148