CHAPTER 5

ACTIVITY BASED
COSTING
LEARNING OUTCOMES

After studying this chapter, you would be able to-

❑ Discuss problem of traditional costing system
❑ Discuss usefulness of Activity Based Costing (ABC)
❑ Discuss Cost Allocation under ABC
❑ Discuss Different level of activities under ABC
❑ Understand stages, advantages, and limitations of ABC
❑ Discuss various requirements in ABC implementation
❑ Explain the concept of Activity Based Management (ABM)
❑ Explain the concept of Activity Based Budgeting (ABB)

Activity Based Costing

Concept Usefullness Cost Hierarchy Steps

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 5.2 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

5.1 INTRODUCTION
As discussed in chapter 4 i.e. Overhead, in traditional costing system, overhead costs are
grouped together under cost center and then absorbed into product costs on either of
the basis such as direct labour hours, machine hours, volume etc. In certain cases, this
traditional costing system gives inaccurate cost information. Though, it should not be
assumed that all traditional absorption costing systems are not accurate enough to give
adequate information for pricing purposes or other long-run management decision
purposes. Some traditional systems treat overheads in a detailed way and relate them
to service cost centres as well as production cost centres. The service centre overheads
are then spread over the production cost centres before absorption rates are calculated.
The main cause of inaccuracy is in the calculation of the overhead rate itself, which is
usually based on direct labour hours or machine hours. These rates assume that products
that take longer to make, generate more overheads and so on.
Organisations, who do not wish to know how much it costs to make a product with
precise accuracy, may be happy with traditional costing system. Others, however,
fix their price on cost basis and need to determine it with reasonable accuracy. The
latter organisations have been greatly benefitted from the development of activity
based costing (ABC), which is considered as a modern absorption costing method,
and was evolved to give more accurate product costs.
5.1.1 Factors prompting the development of ABC
Various factors lead to the development of ABC include:
1. Growing overhead costs because of increasingly automated production
2. Increasing market competition, which necessitated more accurate product
costs.
3. Increasing product diversity to secure economies of scope & increased market share.
4. Decreasing costs of information processing because of continual
improvements and increasing application of information technology.
5.1.2 Usefulness/Suitability of ABC
ABC is particularly needed by organisations for product costing in the following
situations:
1. High amount of overhead: When production overheads are high and form
significant costs, ABC is more useful than traditional costing system.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.3

2. Wide range of products: ABC is most suitable, when, there is diversity in the
product range or there are multiple products.
3. Presence of non-volume related activities: When non-volume related
activities e.g. material handling, inspection set-up, are present significantly
and traditional system cannot be applied, ABC is a superior and better option.
ABC will identify non-value-adding activities in the production process that
might be a suitable focus for attention or elimination.
4. Stiff competition: When the organisation is facing stiff competition and
there is an urgent requirement to compute cost accurately and to fix the
selling price according to the market situation, ABC is very useful. ABC can
also facilitate in reducing cost by identifying non-value-adding activities in the
production process that might be a suitable focus for attention or elimination .

5.2 MEANING AND DEFINITION

Activity Based Costing is an accounting methodology that assigns costs to
activities rather than products or services. This enables resources & overhead
costs to be more accurately assigned to products & services that consume them.
ABC is a technique which involves identification of cost with each cost driving
activity and making it as the basis for apportionment of costs over different
cost objects/ jobs/ products/ customers or services.
ABC assigns cost to activities based on their use of resources. It then assigns cost
to cost objects, such as products or customers, based on their use of activities. ABC
can track the flow of activities in organization by creating a link between the activity
(resource consumption) and the cost object.
CIMA defines ‘Activity Based Costing’ as “An approach to the costing and monitoring
of activities which involves tracing resource consumption and costing final outputs.
Resources are assigned to activities, and activities to cost objects based on
consumption estimates. The latter utilise cost drivers to attach activity costs to
outputs.”

5.3 MEANING OF TERMS USED IN ABC

(i) Activity – Activity, here, refers to an event that incurs cost.
(ii) Cost Object–It is an item for which cost measurement is required e.g. a
product or a customer.

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 5.4 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

(iii) Cost Driver–It is a factor that causes a change in the cost of an activity. There
are two categories of cost driver.
• Resource Cost Driver– It is a measure of the quantity of resources consumed by
an activity. It is used to assign the cost of a resource to an activity or cost pool.
• Activity Cost Driver–It is a measure of the frequency and intensity of demand,
placed on activities by cost objects. It is used to assign activity costs to cost
objects.
(iv) Cost Pool-It represents a group of various individual cost items. It consists of
costs that have same cause and effect relationship. Example machine set-up.
Examples of Cost Drivers:
Business functions Cost Driver
Research and Development • Number of research projects
• Personnel hours on a project
Design of products, services • Number of products in design
and procedures • Number of parts per product
• Number of engineering hours
Customer Service • Number of service calls
• Number of products serviced
• Hours spent on servicing products
Marketing • Number of advertisements
• Number of sales personnel
• Sales revenue
Distribution • Number of units distributed
• Number of customers

5.4 COST ALLOCATION UNDER ABC

Under activity based cost allocation overheads are attributed to products on the
activity base. Traditionally, overhead costs are grouped together under cost centre
and then absorbed into product costs on some basis such as direct labour hours.
Activity based costing identifies the activities which cause cost to be incurred and
searches for fundamental cost drivers of these activities. Once the activities and
there cost drivers have been identified this information can be used to assign
overheads to cost objects (e.g. products) which have actually caused cost to be
incurred.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.5

5.5 TRADITIONAL ABSORBTION COSTING VS ABC

Cost Allocation under Traditional and Activity Based Costing system

Direct Cost
Tracing of Product/
Cost Ascertainment Service
Cost
Indirect Cost
Cost
Allocation

Traditional Costing Activity based Costing

Based on Machine
hours, labour Hours, Based on Cost Driver
Volume etc.

Cost Allocation under Traditional and Activity Based Costing System

In traditional absorption costing overheads are first related to cost centres
(Production & Service Centres) and then to cost objects, i.e., products. In ABC
overheads are related to activities or grouped into cost pools. Then they are related
to the cost objects, e.g., products. The two processes are, therefore, very similar,
but the first stage is different, as ABC uses activities instead of functional
departments (cost centres). The problem with functional departments is that they
tend to include a series of different activities, which incur a number of different
costs that behave in different ways. Activities also tend to run across functions; for
instance, procurement of materials often includes raising a requisition note in a
manufacturing department or stores. It is not raised in the purchasing department
where most procurement costs are incurred. Activity costs tend to behave in a
similar way to each other i.e., they have the same cost driver. Therefore, ABC gives
a more realistic picture of the way in which costs behave.

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 5.6 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Activity Based Costing Traditional Absorption Costing

1. Overheads are related to 1. Overheads are related to cost
activities and grouped into centers/departments.
activity cost pools.
2. Costs are related to activities and 2 Costs are related to cost centers
hence are more realistic. and hence not realistic of cost
behaviour.
3 Activity–wise cost drivers are 3. Time (Hours) are assumed to be
determined. the only cost driver governing
costs in all departments.
4. Activity–wise recovery rates are 4. Either multiple overhead recovery
determined and there is no rates (for each department) or a
concept of a single overhead single overhead recovery rate may
recovery rate. be determined for absorbing
overheads.
5. Cost are assigned to cost 5. Costs are assigned to Cost Units
objects, e.g. customers, i.e. to products, or jobs or hours.
products, services, departments,
etc.
6. Essential activities can be 6. Cost Centers/ departments cannot
simplified and unnecessary be eliminated. Hence, not suitable
activities can be eliminated. Thus, for cost control.
the corresponding costs are also
reduced/ minimized. Hence ABC
aids cost control.

5.6 LEVEL OF ACTIVITIES UNDER ABC METHO-

DOLOGY/COST HIERARCHY
These categories are generally accepted today, but were first identified by Cooper
(1990). The categories of activities help to determine the type of activity cost driver
required.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.7

The categories of activities are:

Level of Meaning Example

Activities
1.Unit level These are those activities • The use of indirect
activities for which the consumption materials/consumables tends to
of resources can be increase in proportion to the
identified with the number number of units produced.
of units produced. • The inspection or testing of every
item produced, if this was deemed
necessary or, perhaps more likely,
every 100th item produced.
2.Batch level The activities such as • Material ordering–where an order
activities setting up of a machine or is placed for every batch of
processing a purchase production
order are performed each • Machine set-up costs–where
time a batch of goods is machines need resetting between
produced. The cost of each different batch of production.
batch related activities • Inspection of products where the
varies with number of first item in every batch is
batches made, but is inspected rather than every 100th
common (or fixed) for all item quoted above.
units within the batch.
3. Product These are the activities • Designing the product,
level which are performed to • Producing parts specifications
activities support different • Keeping technical drawings of
products in product line products up to date.
4.Facilities These are the activities • Maintenance of buildings
level which cannot be directly • Plant security
activities attributed to individual
products. These activities
are necessary to sustain
the manufacturing
process and are common
and joint to all products
manufactured

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 5.8 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

5.7 STAGES IN ACTIVITY BASED COSTING (ABC)

The different stages in ABC calculations are listed below:
(1) Identify the different activities within the organisation: Usually the
number of cost centres that a traditional overhead system uses is quite small,
say up to fifteen. In ABC, the number of activities will be much more, say 200;
the exact number will depend on how the management subdivides the
organisation’s activities. It is possible to break the organisation down into
many very small activities. But if ABC is to be acceptable as practical system
it is necessary to use larger groupings, say, 40 activities may be used in
practice. The additional number of activities over cost centres means that ABC
should be more accurate than the traditional method regardless of anything
else. Some activities may be listed as follows:-
• Production schedule changes
• Customer liaison
• Purchasing
• Production process set up
• Quality control
• Material handling
• Maintenance
(2) Relate the overheads to the activities, both support and primary, that
caused them. This creates ‘cost pools’ or ‘cost buckets’. This will be done
using resource cost drivers that reflect causality.
(3) Support activities are then spread across the primary activities on some
suitable base, which reflects the use of the support activity. The base is the
cost driver that is the measure of how the support activities are used.
(4) Determine the activity cost drivers that will be used to relate the overheads
collected in the cost pools to the cost objects/products. This is based on the
factor that drives the consumption of the activity. The question to ask is –
what causes the activity to incur costs? In production scheduling, for example,
the driver will probably be the number of batches ordered.
(5) Calculate activity cost driver rates for each activity, just as an overhead
absorption rate would be calculated in the traditional system.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.9

Activity cost driver rate = Total cost of activity

Activity driver

The activity driver rate can be used not only to identify cost of products, as
in traditional absorption costing, but it can also be used for costing other cost
objects such as customers/customer segments and distribution channels. The
possibility of costing objects other than products is part of the benefit of ABC.
The activity cost driver rates will be multiplied by the different amounts of
each activity that each product/other cost object consumes.

Cost allocation under ABC

Let us take a small example to understand the steps stated above:
Assume that a company makes widgets and the management decides to install an
ABC system. The management decides that all overhead costs will have only three
cost drivers viz. direct labour hours, machine hours and number of purchase orders.
The general ledger of the company shows the following overhead costs –
General Ledger Amount (`)
Payroll taxes 1,000
Machine maintenance 500
Purchasing Dept. labour 4,000
Fringe benefits 2,000
Purchasing Dept. Supplies 250
Equipment depreciation 750
Electricity 1,250
Unemployment insurance 1,500
Total 11,250

So, which overheads do you think are driven by direct labour hours?

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 5.10 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

The answer is
Payroll taxes ` 1,000
Fringe benefits ` 2,000
Unemployment insurance ` 1,500
Total ` 4,500

Similarly, overheads driven by machine hours include Machine maintenance,

depreciation and Electricity totaling ` 2,500 and finally overheads driven by number
of purchase orders include purchasing department labour and purchasing
department supplies totaling ` 4,250.
Now, overhead rate is calculated by the formula
Total cost in the activity pool ÷ Base,
base being the total number of labour hours, machine hours and total number of
purchase orders in the given case.
Assume that the total number of labour hours be 1,000 hours, machine hours be
250 hours and total purchase orders be 100 orders.
So, Cost driver rate would be
Cost Driver Rate (Rs`)
` 4,500/ 1,000 ` 4.50 per labour hour
` 2,500/ 250 ` 10 per machine hour
` 4,250/ 100 ` 42.50 per purchase order

Now, let’s allocate the overheads between two widgets A and B the details of which
are given below:

Particulars Widget A Widget B

Labour hours 400 600
Machine Hours 100 150
Purchase Orders 50 50

So, total overhead costs applied to widget A = (400 ×4.50) + (100×10) + (50 ×42.50)
= ` 4,925

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.11

And total overheads applied to widget B = (600 ×4.50) + (150×10) + (50×42.50) = `

6,325
So total overheads = ` 4,925 + ` 6,325 = ` 11,250.
Generally, in the traditional costing method, overheads are applied on the basis of
direct labour hours (total 1,000 labour hours in the given case). So, in that case the
overhead absorption rate would be – ` 11,250/ 1000 = ` 11.25 per hour and the
total overheads applied to Widget A would have been = 400 × 11.25 =
` 4,500 and to Widget B = 600 ×11.25 = ` 6,750.
Hence Widget A would have been undervalued and Widget B overvalued by
` 425.
Some of the examples of cost drivers for different activity pools in a production
department are stated below:

Activity Cost Pools Related Cost Drivers

Ordering and Receiving Materials cost Number of purchase orders
Setting up machines costs Number of set-ups
Machining costs Machine hours
Assembling costs Number of parts
Inspecting and testing costs Number of tests
Painting costs Number of parts
Supervising Costs Direct labour hours

ILLUSTRATION 1
ABC Ltd. is a multiproduct company, manufacturing three products A, B and C. The
budgeted costs and production for the year ending 31st March, 2020 are as follows:

A B C
Production quantity (Units) 4,000 3,000 1,600
Resources per Unit:
- Direct Materials (Kg.) 4 6 3
- Direct Labour (Minutes) 30 45 60

The budgeted direct labour rate was ` 10 per hour, and the budgeted material cost
was ` Rs 2 per kg. Production overheads were budgeted at ` 99,450 and were
absorbed to products using the direct labour hour rate. ABC Ltd. followed the

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 5.12 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Absorption Costing System.

ABC Ltd. is now considering to adopt an Activity Based Costing system. The following
additional information is made available for this purpose.
1. Budgeted overheads were analysed into the following:

(`)
Material handling 29,100
Storage costs 31,200
Electricity 39,150

2. The cost drivers identified were as follows:

Material handling Weight of material handled

Storage costs Number of batches of material
Electricity Number of Machine operations

3. Data on Cost Drivers was as follows:

A B C
For complete production:
Batches of material 10 5 15
Per unit of production:
Number of Machine operations 6 3 2
You are requested to:
1. PREPARE a statement for management showing the unit costs and total costs
of each product using the absorption costing method.
2. PREPARE a statement for management showing the product costs of each
product using the ABC approach.
3. STATE what are the reasons for the different product costs under the two
approaches?
SOLUTION
1. Traditional Absorption Costing

A B C Total
(a) Quantity (units) 4,000 3,000 1,600 8,600

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.13

(b) Direct labour (minutes) 30 45 60 -

(c) Direct labour hours (a × b)/60 minutes 2,000 2,250 1,600 5,850
Overhead rate per direct labour hour:
= Budgeted overheads Budgeted labour hours
= ` 99,450  5,850 hours
= ` 17 per direct labour hour
Unit Costs:

A (`) B (`) C (`)

Direct Costs:
- Direct Labour 5.00 7.50 10.00
- Direct Material 8.00 12.00 6.00
Production Overhead: 8.50 12.75 17.00
 17×30   17×45   17×60 
     
 60   60   60 
Total unit costs 21.50 32.25 33.00
Number of units 4,000 3,000 1,600
Total costs 86,000 96,750 52,800

2. Activity Based Costing

A B C Total
Quantity (units) 4,000 3,000 1,600 -
Material Weight per unit (Kg.) 4 6 3 -
Total material weight 16,000 18,000 4,800 38,800
Machine operations per unit 6 3 2 -
Total operations 24,000 9,000 3,200 36,200
Total batches of Material 10 5 15 30

Material handling rate per kg. = ` 29,100  38,800 kg. = ` 0.75 per kg.

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 5.14 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Electricity rate per machine operations = ` 39,150  36,200

= ` 1.081 per machine operations
Storage rate per batch = ` 31,200  30 batches
= ` 1,040 per batch
Unit Costs:

A (`) B (`) C (`)

Direct Costs:
Direct Labour 5.00 7.50 10.00
Direct material 8.00 12.00 6.00
Production Overheads:
Material Handling 3.00 4.50 2.25
(`0.75  4) (`0.75  6) (`0.75  3)
Electricity 6.49 3.24 2.16
(`1.081  6) (`1.081  3) (`1.081  2)
Storage 2.60 1.73 9.75
 ` 1,040   `1,040   `1,040 
 `10    `5×   `15× 
 4,000   3,000   1,600 
Total unit costs 25.09 28.97 30.16
Number of units 4,000 3,000 1,600
Total costs ` 1,00,360 ` 86,910 ` 48,256

3. Comments: The difference in the total costs under the two systems is due to
the differences in the overheads borne by each of the products. The Activity Based
Costs appear to be more precise.

5.8 ADVANTAGES OF ACTIVITY BASED COSTING

The main advantages of using Activity Based Costing are:
(i) More accurate costing of products/services.
(ii) Overhead allocation is done on logical basis.
(iii) It enables better pricing policies by supplying accurate cost information.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.15

(iv) Utilizes unit cost rather than just total cost

(v) Help to identify non-value added activities which facilitates cost reduction.
(vi) It is helpful to the organizations with multiple products.
(v) It highlights problem areas which require attention of the management.

5.9 LIMITATIONS OF ACTIVITY BASED COSTING

The main limitations using Activity Based Costing are:
(i) It is more expensive, particularly in comparison with traditional costing
system.
(ii) It is not helpful to the small organizations.
(iii) It may not be applied to organizations with limited products.
(iv) Selection of the most suitable cost driver may not be easy/ may be difficult
or complicated.

5.10 REQUIRMENTS IN ABC IMPLEMENTATION

A number of distinct practical stages are required in the ABC implementation which
are given as below:
(1) Staff Training: The co-operation of the workforce is critical to the successful
implementation of ABC. Staff training should be done to create an awareness on
the purpose of ABC.
(2) Process Specification: Informal, but structured interviews with key members of
personnel will identify the different stages of the production process, the commitment
of resources to each, processing times and bottlenecks.
(3) Activity Definition: The activities must be defined clearly in the early stage in
order to manage the problems, if any, effectively. There might be overloading of
information from the new data, but the same is needed in codification.
(4) Activity Driver Selection: Cost driver for each activity shall be selected.
(5) Assigning Cost: A single representative activity driver can be used to assign
costs from the activity pools to the cost objects.

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5.11 PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS OF ACTIVITY

BASED COSTING
5.11.1 As a Decision-Making Tool
ABC can act as a decision making tool in the following ways:
(i) ABC along with some other cost management technique can be utilized to
improve performance and profitability of an organization.
(ii) Wholesale distributors can gain significant advantage in the decision-making
process through implementation of ABC concepts by correlating costs to various
activities. Introduction of new product or vendor can be better decided through
ABC.
(iii) ABC can assist in decisions related to facility and resource expansion. Often
the basis for relocation or opening of a new distribution center is based on cost
associations. Reduction in freight or other logistic costs can offset the expense of
the new facility, staff or equipment. The ABC model can identify the specific cost
elements being targeted, providing a much clearer picture which aids in
management actions.
(iv) ABC augments decision support for human resources.. Since the activity (and
therefore costs) can be associated to an individual, new levels of financial
performance can be determined. This might be evident in the case of branch
management or sales.
(v) Companies who wish to determine price based on cost plus markup basis find
ABC method of costing very relevant and are able to determine competitive prices
for their products.
5.11.2 As Activity Based Management
Meaning of Activity Based Management
The term Activity based management (ABM) is used to describe the cost
management application of ABC. The use of ABC as a costing tool to manage
costs at activity level is known as Activity Based Cost Management (ABM).
ABM is a discipline that focuses on the efficient and effective management of
activities as the route to continuously improving the value received by customers.
ABM utilizes cost information gathered through ABC.

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Various analysis in Activity Based Management

The various types of analysis involved in ABM are as follows:
(1) Cost Driver Analysis: The factors that cause activities to be performed need
to be identified in order to manage activity costs. Cost driver analysis identifies the
causal factors.
(2) Activity Analysis.
(a) Value-Added Activities (VA): The value-added activities are those
activities which are indispensable in order to complete the process. The
customers are usually willing to pay (in some way) for these services.
For example, polishing furniture by a manufacturer dealing in furniture
is a value added activity.
(b) Non-Value-Added Activities (NVA): The NVA activity represents work that
is not valued by the external or internal customer. NVA activities do
not improve the quality or function of a product or service, but they can
adversely affect costs and prices. Moving materials and machine set up
for a production run are examples of NVA activities.
(3) Performance Analysis: Performance analysis involves the identification of
appropriate measures to report the performance of activity centres or other
organisational units, consistent with each unit’s goals and objectives.
Activity Based Management in Business
Activity based management can be used in the following ways
(i) Cost Reduction: ABM helps the organisation to identify costs against
activities and to find opportunities to streamline or reduce the costs or eliminate
the entire activity, especially if there is no value added.
(ii) Business Process Re-engineering: Business process re-engineering involves
examining business processes and making substantial changes to how
organisation currently operates. ABM is a powerful tool for measuring business
performance, determining the cost of business output and is used as a means of
identifying opportunities to improve process efficiency and effectiveness.
(iii) Benchmarking: Benchmarking is a process of comparing of ABC-derived
activity costs of one segment of company with those of other segments . It
requires uniformity in the definition of activities and measurement of their costs.

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 5.18 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

(iv) Performance Measurement: Many organisations are now focusing on

activity performance as a means of facing competitors and managing costs by
monitoring the efficiency and effectiveness of activities.

Area Measure
Quality of purchased component Zero defects
Quality of output % yield
Customer awareness Orders; number of complaints

5.11.3 Facilitate Activity Based Budgeting

Meaning of Activity Based Budgeting (ABB)
Activity based budgeting analyse the resource input or cost for each activity. It
provides a framework for estimating the amount of resources required in
accordance with the budgeted level of activity. Actual results can be compared with
budgeted results to highlight both , in financial and non-financial terms, those
activities with major discrepancies from budget for potential reduction in supply of
resources. It is a planning and control system which seeks to support the objectives
of continuous improvement. It means planning and controlling the expected
activities of the organization to derive a cost-effective budget that meet forecast
workload and agreed strategic goals. ABB is the reversing of the ABC process to
produce financial plans and budgets.
Key Elements of ABB
The three key elements of activity based budgeting are as follows:-
 Type of work to be done
 Quantity of work to be done
 Cost of work to be done
Benefits of ABB
Few benefits of activity based budgeting are as follows:-
1. Activity Based Budgeting (ABB) can enhance accuracy of financial forecasts
and increasing management understanding.
2. When automated, ABB can rapidly and accurately produce financial plans and
models based on varying levels of volume assumptions.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.19

3. ABB eliminates much of the needless rework created by traditional budgeting

techniques.
ILLUSTRATION 2
MST Limited has collected the following data for its two activities. It calculates activity
cost rates based on cost driver capacity.

Activity Cost Driver Capacity Cost

Power Kilowatt hours 50,000 kilowatt hours ` 2,00,000
Quality Inspections Number of Inspections 10,000 Inspections ` 3,00,000
The company makes three products M, S and T. For the year ended March 31, 2020,
the following consumption of cost drivers was reported:

Product Kilowatt hours Quality Inspections

M 10,000 3,500
S 20,000 2,500
T 15,000 3,000
Required:
(i) COMPUTE the costs allocated to each product from each activity.
(ii) CALCULATE the cost of unused capacity for each activity.
(iii) DISCUSS the factors the management considers in choosing a capacity level to
compute the budgeted fixed overhead cost rate.
SOLUTION
(i) Statement of cost allocation to each product from each activity

Product
M (`) S (`) T (`) Total
(`)
Power (Refer 40,000 80,000 60,000 1,80,000
to working (10,000 kWh (20,000 kWh (15,000 kWh
note) × `4) ×`4) ×`4)
Quality 1,05,000 75,000 90,000 2,70,000
Inspections (3,500 (2,500 (3,000
(Refer to inspections inspections × inspections ×
working note) × `30) ` 30) ` 30)

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 5.20 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Working note
Rate per unit of cost driver:

Power (` 2,00,000 / 50,000 kWh) ` 4/kWh

Quality Inspection (` 3,00,000 / 10,000 ` 30 per inspection
inspections)
(ii) Computation of cost of unused capacity for each activity:

(`)
Power (` 2,00,000 – ` 1,80,000) or 5,000 x 4 20,000
Quality Inspections (` 3,00,000 – ` 2,70,000) or 1,000 x 30 30,000
Total cost of unused capacity 50,000

(iii) Factors management consider in choosing a capacity level to compute

the budgeted fixed overhead cost rate:
- Effect on product costing & capacity management
- Effect on pricing decisions.
- Effect on performance evaluation
- Effect on financial statements
- Regulatory requirements.
- Difficulties in forecasting.
ILLUSTRATION 3
ABC Ltd. Manufactures two types of machinery equipment Y and Z and
applies/absorbs overheads on the basis of direct-labour hours. The budgeted
overheads and direct-labour hours for the month of December, 2020 are
` 12,42,500 and 20,000 hours respectively. The information about Company’s
products is as follows:

Equipment Equipment
Y Z
Budgeted Production volume 2,500 units 3,125 units
Direct material cost ` 300 per unit ` 450 per unit
Direct labour cost

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.21

Y : 3 hours @ ` 150 per hour

Z : 4 hours @ ` 150 per hour ` 450 ` 600
ABC Ltd.’s overheads of ` 12,42,500 can be identified with three major activities:
Order Processing (` 2,10,000), machine processing ( ` 8,75,000), and product
inspection (` 1,57,500). These activities are driven by number of orders processed,
machine hours worked, and inspection hours, respectively. The data relevant to these
activities is as follows:
Orders processed Machine hours Inspection hours
worked
Y 350 23,000 4,000
Z 250 27,000 11,000
Total 600 50,000 15,000

Required:
(i) Assuming use of direct-labour hours to absorb/apply overheads to production,
COMPUTE the unit manufacturing cost of the equipment Y and Z, if the
budgeted manufacturing volume is attained.
(ii) Assuming use of activity-based costing, COMPUTE the unit manufacturing costs
of the equipment Y and Z, if the budgeted manufacturing volume is achieved.
(iii) ABC Ltd.’s selling prices are based heavily on cost. By using direct-labour hours
as an application base, CALCULATE the amount of cost distortion (under-costed
or over-costed) for each equipment.
SOLUTION
(i) Overheads application base: Direct labour hours

Equipment Equipment
Y (`) Z (`)
Direct material cost 300 450
Direct labour cost 450 600
Overheads* 186.38 248.50
936.38 1,298.50

Budgeted overheads ` 12, 42,500

*Pre-determined rate = = = `62.125
Budgeted direct labour hours 20,000 hours

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 5.22 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

(ii) Estimation of Cost-Driver rate

Overhead cost Cost-driver level Cost driver

Activity rate
(`) (`)
Order processing 2,10,000 600 350
Orders processed
Machine 8,75,000 50,000 17.50
processing Machine hours
Inspection 1,57,500 15,000 10.50
Inspection hours

Equipment Equipment
Y (`) Z (`)
Direct material cost 300 450
Direct labour cost 450 600
Prime Cost 750 1,050
Overhead Cost
Order processing 350 : 250 or Rs 350 per 1,22,500 87,500
order
Machine processing 23,000 : 27,000 or ` 4,02,500 4,72,500
17.5 per hour
Inspection 4,000 : 11,000 42,000 1,15,500
Total overhead cost 5,67,000 6,75,500

Per unit cost

5,67,000 /2,500 226.80 `. 216.16
6,75,500/ 3,125
Unit manufacturing cost (Prime ` 976.80 ` 1,266.16
Cost + Overhead per unit)

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.23

(iii)
Equipment Equipment
Y (`) Z (`)
Unit manufacturing cost–using direct
labour hours as an application base 936.38 1,298.50
Unit manufacturing cost-using activity 976.80 1,266.16
based costing
Cost distortion (-)40.42 + 32.34

Low volume product Y is under-costed and high volume product Z is over costed
using direct labour hours for overhead absorption.
ILLUSTRATION 4
‘Humara - Apna’ bank offers three products, viz., deposits, Loans and Credit Cards.
The bank has selected 4 activities for a detailed budgeting exercise, following activity
based costing methods.
The bank wants to know the product wise total cost per unit for the selected activities,
so that prices may be fixed accordingly.
The following information is made available to formulate the budget:

Activity Present Estimation for the budget

Cost (`) period
ATM Services:
(a) Machine Maintenance 4,00,000 All fixed, no change.
(b) Rents 2,00,000 Fully fixed, no change.
(c) Currency Replenishment 1,00,000 Expected to double during budget
Cost period.
7,00,000 (This activity is driven by no. of
ATM transactions)
Computer Processing 5,00,000 Half this amount is fixed and no
change is expected.
The variable portion is expected
to increase to three times the
current level.

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 5.24 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

(This activity is driven by the

number of computer
transactions)
Issuing Statements 18,00,000 Presently, 3 lakh statements are
made. In the budget period, 5
lakh statements are expected.
For every increase of one lakh
statement, one lakh rupees is the
budgeted increase.
(This activity is driven by the
number of statements)
Computer Inquiries 2,00,000 Estimated to increase by 80%
during the budget period.
(This activity is driven by
telephone minutes)

The activity drivers and their budgeted quantifies are given below:
Activity Drivers Deposits Loans Credit
Cards
No. of ATM Transactions 1,50,000 --- 50,000
No. of Computer Processing 15,00,000 2,00,000 3,00,000
Transactions
No. of Statements to be issued 3,50,000 50,000 1,00,000
Telephone Minutes 3,60,000 1,80,000 1,80,000

The bank budgets a volume of 58,600 deposit accounts, 13,000 loan accounts, and
14,000 Credit Card Accounts.
Required:
(i) CALCULATE the budgeted rate for each activity.
(ii) PREPARE the budgeted cost statement activity wise.
(iii) COMPUTE the budgeted product cost per account for each product using (i) and
(ii) above.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.25

SOLUTION
Statement Showing “Budgeted Cost per unit of the Product”
Activity Activity Activity No. of Activity Deposits Loans Credit
Cost Driver Units of Rate (`) Cards
(Budgeted) Activity
(` ) Driver
(Budget)
ATM 8,00,000 No. of ATM 2,00,000 4.00 6,00,000 --- 2,00,000
Services Transaction
Computer 10,00,000 No. of 20,00,000 0.50 7,50,000 1,00,000 1,50,000
Processing Computer
processing
Transaction
Issuing 20,00,000 No. of 5,00,000 4.00 14,00,000 2,00,000 4,00,000
Statements Statements
Customer 3,60,000 Telephone 7,20,000 0.50 1,80,000 90,000 90,000
Inquiries Minutes
Budgeted 41,60,000 29,30,000 3,90,000 8,40,000
Cost
Units of Product (as estimated in the budget period) 58,600 13,000 14,000
Budgeted Cost per unit of the product 50 30 60

Working Note

Activity Budgeted Remark

Cost (`)
ATM Services:
(a) Machine Maintenance 4,00,000 − All fixed, no change.
(b) Rents 2,00,000 − Fully fixed, no change.
(c) Currency Replenishment − Doubled during budget
Cost 2,00,000 period.
Total 8,00,000

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 5.26 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Computer Processing 2,50,000 − ` 2,50,000 (half of ` 5,00,000)

is fixed and no change is
expected.
7,50,000 − ` 2,50,000 (variable portion) is
expected to increase to three
Total 10,00,000
times the current level.
Issuing Statements 18,00,000 − Existing.
2,00,000 − 2 lakh statements are
expected to be increased in
budgeted period. For every
increase of one lakh
statement, one lakh rupees is
Total 20,00,000 the budgeted increase.
Computer Inquiries 3,60,000 − Estimated to increase by 80%
during the budget period.
Total 3,60,000 (` 2,00,000 x 180%)

SUMMARY
 Activity based costing is an accounting methodology that assigns costs to
activities rather than products or services. This enables resources & overhead
costs to be more accurately assigned to products & services that consume
them.
 Unit level activities, batch level activities, product level activities and facility
level activities are the categories of activities that help to determine the type
of activity cost driver required.
 ABC is very much useful to the organization with multiple products.
 The limitations of ABC are that, it is very costly and cannot be applied to all
companies.
 The use of ABC as a costing tool to manage costs at activity level is known as
Activity Based Cost Management (ABM). ABM is a discipline that focuses on
the efficient and effective management of activities as the route to
continuously improving the value received by customers. ABM utilizes cost
information gathered through ABC.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.27

 The value-added activities are those activities which are indispensable in

order to complete the process.
 NVA activity represents work that is not valued by the external or internal
customer. NVA activities do not improve the quality or function of a product
or service, but they can adversely affect costs and prices.
 Activity-based budgeting is a process of planning and controlling the
expected activities for the organisation to derive a cost-effective budget that
meets forecast workload and agreed strategic goals.
 Key elements of ABB are type of work/activity to be performed, quantity of
work/activity to be performed and cost of work/activity to be performed.

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE

MCQs based Questions
1. A cost driver is:
(a) An item of production overheads
(b) A common cost which is shared over cost centres
(c) Any cost relating to transport
(d) An activity which generates costs
2. In activity based costing, costs are accumulated by activity using:
(a) Cost drivers
(b) Cost objects
(c) Cost pools
(d) Cost benefit analysis
3. A cost driver:
(a) Is a force behind the overhead cost
(b) Is an allocation base
(c) Is a transaction that is a significant determinant of cost
(d) All of the above
4. Which of the following is not a correct match:

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 5.28 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Activity Cost Driver

a) Production Scheduling Number of Production runs
b) Despatching Number of dispatch orders
c) Goods receiving Goods received orders
d) Inspection Machine hours
5. Transactions undertaken by support department personnel are the
appropriate cost drivers. Find the one which is not appropriate:
(a) The number of purchase, supplies and customers’ orders drives the cost
associated with new material inventory, work-in-progress and finished
goods inventory
(b) The number of production runs undertaken drives production
scheduling, inspection and material handling
(c) The quality of raw material issued drives the cost of receiving
department costs
(d) The number of packing orders drives the packing costs
6. Steps in ABC include:
(a) Identification of activities and their respective costs
(b) Identification of cost driver of each activity and computation of an
allocation rate per activity
(c) Allocation of overhead cost to products/ services based on the activities
involved
(d) All of the above
7. Which of the following is not a benefit of ABC?
(a) Accurate cost allocation
(b) Improved decision making
(c) Better control on activity and costs
(d) Reduction of prime cost
8. The steps involved for installation of ABC in a manufacturing company include
the following except:
(a) Borrowing fund

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.29

(b) Feasibility study

(c) Building up necessary IT infrastructure and training of line employees
(d) Strategy and value chain analysis
9. Which of the following statements are true: (1) Activity based Management
involves activity analysis and performance measurement. (2) Activity based
costing serves as a major source of information in ABM.
(a) (1) True; (2) False
(b) (1) True; (2) True
(c) (1) False; (2) True
(d) (1) False; (2) False
10. The key elements of activity based budgeting are:
(a) Type of activity to be performed
(b) Quantity of activity to be performed
(c) Cost of activity to be performed
(d) All of the above
Theoretical Questions:
1. DEFINE the following terms:
(i) Cost driver
(ii) Activity cost pool
2. EXPLAIN in brief the problems of traditional costing where overhead costs
are allocated based on volume
3. STATE what is Activity based costing? How are product costs determined in
ABC?
4. A manufacturing company in India wants to replace its traditional costing
system by ABC. It produces a number of products, each having complex
production process of different degree. SUGGEST various requirements for
installing activity based costing.
5. DESCRIBE various levels of activities under ABC.
6. STATE what are the benefits of ABC?

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 5.30 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

7. STATE what are the limitations of ABC?

8. STATE what are the practical applications of ABC?
9. STATE what is Activity based Management? How does ABC help ABM?
10. DEFINE Activity based Budgeting. STATE what are its key elements?

Practical Problems
1. Woolmark Ltd. manufactures three types of products namely P, Q and R. The
data relating to a period are as under:
Particulars P Q R
Machine hours per unit 10 18 14
Direct Labour hours per unit 4 12 8
Direct Material per unit (`) 90 80 120
Production (units) 3,000 5,000 20,000

Currently the company uses traditional costing method and absorbs all
production overheads on the basis of machine hours. The machine hour rate
of overheads is ` 6 per hour. Direct labour hour rate is ` 20 per hour.
The company proposes to use activity based costing system and the activity
analysis is as under:
Particulars P Q R
Batch size (units) 150 500 1,000
Number of purchase orders per batch 3 10 8
Number of inspections per batch 5 4 3

The total production overheads are analysed as under:

Machine set up costs……………………………………… 20%

Machine operation costs……………………………………. 30%
Inspection costs……………………………………………… 40%
Material procurement related costs……………………….. 10%
Required
(i) CALCULATE the cost per unit of each product using traditional method
of absorbing all production overheads on the basis of machine hours.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.31

(ii) CALCULATE the cost per unit of each product using activity based
costing principles.
2. RST Limited specializes in the distribution of pharmaceutical products. It buys
from the pharmaceutical companies and resells to each of the three different
markets.
(i) General Supermarket Chains
(ii) Drugstore Chains
(iii) Chemist Shops
The following data for the month of April, 2020 in respect of RST Limited has
been reported:

General Drugstore Chemist

Supermarket Chains Shops
Chains
(`) (`) (`)
Average revenue per delivery 84,975 28,875 5,445
Average cost of goods sold per 82,500 27,500 4,950
delivery
Number of deliveries 330 825 2,750

In the past, RST Limited has used gross margin percentage to evaluate the
relative profitability of its distribution channels.
The company plans to use activity –based costing for analysing the
profitability of its distribution channels.
The Activity analysis of RST Limited is as under:

Activity Area Cost Driver

Customer purchase order Purchase orders by customers
processing
Line-item ordering Line-items per purchase order
Store delivery Store deliveries
Cartons dispatched to stores Cartons dispatched to a store per
delivery
Shelf-stocking at customer store Hours of shelf-stocking

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 5.32 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

The April, 2020 operating costs (other than cost of goods sold) of RST Limited
are ` 8,27,970. These operating costs are assigned to five activity areas. The
cost in each area and the quantity of the cost allocation basis used in that
area for April, 2020 are as follows:

Activity Area Total costs in Total Units of Cost

April, 2020 (`) Allocation Base used
in April, 2020
Customer purchase order 2,20,000 5,500 orders
processing
Line-item ordering 1,75,560 58,520 line items
Store delivery 1,95,250 3,905 store deliveries
Cartons dispatched to 2,09,000 2,09,000 cartons
store
Shelf-stocking at 28,160 1,760 hours
customer store

Other data for April, 2020 include the following:

General Drugstore Chemist

Supermarket Chains Shops
Chains
Total number of orders 385 990 4,125
Average number of line items 14 12 10
per order
Total number of store deliveries 330 825 2,750
Average number of cartons 300 80 16
shipped per store delivery
Average number of hours of 3 0.6 0.1
shelf-stocking per store
delivery
Required:
(i) COMPUTE for April, 2020 gross-margin percentage for each of its three
distribution channels and compute RST Limited’s operating income.
(ii) COMPUTE the April, 2020 rate per unit of the cost-allocation base for
each of the five activity areas.

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.33

(iii) COMPUTE the operating income of each distribution channel in April,

2020 using the activity-based costing information. Comment on the
results. What new insights are available with the activity-based cost
information?
(iv) DESCRIBE four challenges one would face in assigning the total April,
2020 operating costs of ` 8,27,970 to five activity areas.
3. Family Store wants information about the profitability of individual product
lines: Soft drinks, Fresh produce and Packaged food. Family store provides the
following data for the year 2019-20 for each product line:
Soft drinks Fresh Packaged
produce food
Revenues ` 39,67,500 ` 1,05,03,000 ` 60,49,500
Cost of goods sold ` 30,00,000 ` 75,00,000 ` 45,00,000
Cost of bottles returned ` 60,000 `0 `0
Number of purchase orders 360 840 360
placed
Number of deliveries 300 2,190 660
received
Hours of shelf-stocking time 540 5,400 2,700
Items sold 1,26,000 11,04,000 3,06,000
Family store also provides the following information for the year 2019-20:
Activity Description of activity Total Cost Cost-allocation
base
Bottles Returning of empty ` 60,000 Direct tracing to
returns bottles soft drink line
Ordering Placing of orders for ` 7,80,000 1,560 purchase
purchases orders
Delivery Physical delivery and ` 12,60,000 3,150 deliveries
receipt of goods
Shelf Stocking of goods on ` 8,64,000 8,640 hours of
stocking store shelves and on- shelf-stocking time

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 5.34 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

going restocking
Customer Assistance provided to ` 15,36,000 15,36,000 items
Support customers including sold
check-out

Required:
(i) Family store currently allocates support cost (all cost other than cost of
goods sold) to product lines on the basis of cost of goods sold of each
product line. CALCULATE the operating income and operating income
as a % of revenues for each product line.
(ii) If Family Store allocates support costs (all costs other than cost of goods
sold) to product lines using and activity-based costing system,
CALCULATE the operating income and operating income as a % of
revenues for each product line.
4. Alpha Limited has decided to analyse the profitability of its five new
customers. It buys bottled water at ` 90 per case and sells to retail customers
at a list price of ` 108 per case. The data pertaining to five customers are:
Customers
A B C D E
Cases sold 4,680 19,688 1,36,800 71,550 8,775
Listed Selling Price ` 108 ` 108 ` 108 ` 108 ` 108
Actual Selling Price ` 108 ` 106.20 ` 99 ` 104.40 ` 97.20
Number of Purchase 15 25 30 25 30
orders
Number of Customer 2 3 6 2 3
visits
Number of deliveries 10 30 60 40 20
Kilometers travelled 20 6 5 10 30
per delivery
Number of 0 0 0 0 1
expedited deliveries
Its five activities and their cost drivers are:

Activity Cost Driver Rate

Order taking ` 750 per purchase order
Customer visits ` 600 per customer visit

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.35

Deliveries ` 5.75 per delivery Km travelled

Product handling ` 3.75 per case sold
Expedited deliveries ` 2,250 per expedited delivery
Required:
(i) COMPUTE the customer-level operating income of each of five retail
customers now being examined (A, B, C, D and E). Comment on the results.
(ii) STATE what insights are gained by reporting both the list selling price
and the actual selling price for each customer?
5. BABYSOFT is a global brand created by Bio-organic Ltd. The company
manufactures three ranges of beauty soaps i.e. BABYSOFT- Gold, BABYSOFT-
Pearl, and BABYSOFT- Diamond. The budgeted costs and production for the
month of December, 2020 are as follows:
BABYSOFT- Gold BABYSOFT- Pearl BABYSOFT-
Diamond
Production of 4,000 3,000 2,000
soaps (Units)
Resources per Qty Rate Qty Rate Qty Rate
Unit:
- Essential 60 ml ` 200 / 100 ml 55 ml ` 300 / 100 ml 65 ml ` 300 / 100
Oils ml
- Cocoa 20 g ` 200 / 100 g 20 g ` 200 / 100 g 20 g ` 200 / 100 g
Butter
- Filtered 30 ml ` 15 / 100 ml 30 ml ` 15 / 100 ml 30 ml ` 15 / 100 ml
Water
- Chemicals 10 g ` 30 / 100 g 12 g ` 50 / 100 g 15 g ` 60 / 100 g
- Direct 30 ` 10 / hour 40 ` 10 / hour 60 ` 10 / hour
Labour minutes minutes minutes
Bio-organic Ltd. followed an Absorption Costing System and absorbed its
production overheads, to its products using direct labour hour rate, which
were budgeted at ` 1,98,000.
Now, Bio-organic Ltd. is considering adopting an Activity Based Costing
system. For this, additional information regarding budgeted overheads and
their cost drivers is provided below:

Particulars (`) Cost drivers

Forklifting cost 58,000 Weight of material lifted

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 5.36 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Supervising cost 60,000 Direct labour hours

Utilities 80,000 Number of Machine operations
The number of machine operations per unit of production are 5, 5, and 6 for
BABYSOFT- Gold, BABYSOFT- Pearl, and BABYSOFT- Diamond respectively.
(Consider (i) Mass of 1 litre of Essential Oils and Filtered Water equivalent to
0.8 kg and 1 kg respectively (ii) Mass of output produced is equivalent to the
mass of input materials taken together.)
You are requested to:
(i) PREPARE a statement showing the unit costs and total costs of each
product using the absorption costing method.
(ii) PREPARE a statement showing the product costs of each product using
the ABC approach.
(iii) STATE what are the reasons for the different product costs under the
two approaches?

ANSWERS/SOLUTIONS
MCQs based Questions
1. (d) 2. (c) 3. (d) 4. (d) 5. (c) 6. (d)
7. (d) 8. (a) 9. (b) 10. (d)

Theoretical Questions
1. Please refer paragraph 5.3
2. Please refer paragraph 5.1
3. Please refer paragraph 5.2, 5.5 and 5.7
4. Please refer paragraph 5.10
5. Please refer paragraph 5.6
6. Please refer paragraph 5.8
7. Please refer paragraph 5.9
8. Please refer paragraph 5.11
9. Please refer paragraph 5.11.2
10. Please refer paragraph 5.11.3

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Practical Questions
1. (i) Statement Showing “Cost per unit - Traditional Method”

Particulars of Costs P Q R

(`) (`) (`)

Direct Materials 90 80 120

Direct Labour [(4, 12, 8 hours)  ` 20] 80 240 160
Production Overheads [(10, 18, 14 hours)  ` 6] 60 108 84
Cost per unit 230 428 364

(ii) Statement Showing “Cost per unit - Activity Based Costing”

Products P Q R

Production (units) 3,000 5,000 20,000

(`) (`) (`)
Direct Materials (90, 80, 120) 2,70,000 4,00,000 24,00,000
Direct Labour (80, 240, 160) 2,40,000 12,00,000 32,00,000
Machine Related Costs @ ` 1.80
per hour 54,000 1,62,000 5,04,000
(30,000, 90,000, 2,80,000)

Setup Costs @ ` 9,600 per setup

(20, 10, 20) 1,92,000 96,000 1,92,000
Inspection Costs @ ` 4,800 per
inspection 4,80,000 1,92,000 2,88,000
(100, 40, 60)

Purchase Related Costs @ ` 750

per purchase (60, 100, 160) 45,000 75,000 1,20,000
Total Costs 12,81,000 21,25,000 67,04,000
Cost per unit (Total Cost  Units) 427.00 425.00 335.20

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 5.38 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Workings
Number of Batches, Purchase Orders, and Inspections-

Particulars P Q R Total
A. Production (units) 3,000 5,000 20,000
B. Batch Size (units) 150 500 1,000
C. Number of Batches (A÷B) 20 10 20 50
D. Number of Purchase Order per
batch 3 10 8
E. Total Purchase Orders [C  D] 60 100 160 320
F. Number of Inspections per
batch 5 4 3
G. Total Inspections [C  F] 100 40 60 200

Total Machine Hours-

Particulars P Q R

A. Machine Hours per unit 10 18 14

B. Production (units) 3,000 5,000 20,000
C. Total Machine Hours [A  B] 30,000 90,000 2,80,000

Total Machine Hours = 4,00,000

Total Production Overheads-
= 4,00,000 hrs.  ` 6 = ` 24,00,000
Cost Driver Rates-

Cost Pool % Overheads Cost Driver Cost Cost Driver

Basis Driver Rate
(`) (Units) (`)
Setup 20% 4,80,000 Number of 50 9,600 per
batches Setup
Inspection 40% 9,60,000 Number of 200 4,800 per
inspections Inspection

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.39

Purchases 10% 2,40,000 Number of 320 750 per

purchases Purchase
Machine 30% 7,20,000 Machine 4,00,000 1.80 per
Operations Hours Machine Hour

2. (i) RST Limited’s

Statement of operating income and gross margin percentage
for each of its three distribution channel
particulars General Super Drugstore Chemist Shops Total
Market Chains
Chains
Revenues: (`) 2,80,41,750 2,38,21,875 1,49,73,750 6,68,37,375
(330 × ` 84,975) (825 × ` 28,875) (2,750 × ` 5,445)
Less: Cost of 2,72,25,000 2,26,87,500 1,36,12,500 635,25,000
goods sold: (`) (330 × ` 82,500) (825 × ` 27,500) (2,750 × ` 4,950)
Gross Margin: 8,16,750 11,34,375 13,61,250 33,12,375
(`)
Less: Other
operating
costs: (`) 8,27,970
Operating 24,84,405
income: (`)
Gross Margin 2.91% 4.76 % 9.09% 4.96%
Operating 3.72
income %

(ii) Computation of rate per unit of the cost allocation base for
each of the five activity areas for April 2020

(`)
Customer purchase order processing 40 per order
(` 2,20,000/ 5,500 orders)
Line item ordering 3 per line item order
(` 1,75,560/ 58,520 line items)
Store delivery 50 per delivery

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 5.40 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

(` 1,95,250/ 3,905 store deliveries)

Cartons dispatched 1 per dispatch
(` 2,09,000/ 2,09,000 dispatches)
Shelf-stocking at customer store (`) 16 Per hour
(` 28,160/ 1,760 hours)

(iii) Operating Income Statement of each distribution channel

in April-2020 (Using the Activity based Costing information)

General Drugstore Chemist

Super Chains Shops
Market
Chains
Gross margin (`) : (A) 8,16,750 11,34,375 13,61,250
(Refer to (i) part of the answer)
Operating cost (`): (B) 1,62,910 1,90,410 4,74,650
(Refer to working note)
Operating income (`): (A–B) 6,53,840 9,43,965 8,86,600
Operating income (in %) 2.33 3.96 5.92
(Operating income/Revenue) × 100

Comments and new insights: The activity-based cost information highlights,

how the ‘Chemist Shops’ uses a larger amount of RST Ltd.’s resources per
revenue than do the other two distribution channels. Ratio of operating costs
to revenues, across these markets is:

General supermarket chains 0.58%

(` 1,62,910/ ` 2,80,41,750) × 100
Drug store chains 0.80%
(` 1,90,410/ ` 2,38,21,875) × 100
Chemist shops 3.17%
(` 4,74,650/ ` 1,49,73,750) ×100

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 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.41

Working note:
Computation of operating cost of each distribution channel:
General Super Drugstore Chemist
Market Chains Chains Shops
(`) (`)
(`)
Customer 15,400 39,600 1,65,000
purchase order (` 40 × 385 (` 40 × 990 (` 40 ×4125
processing orders) orders) orders)
Line item 16,170 35,640 1,23,750
ordering (` 3 × 14 x (` 3 × 12 x 990) (` 3 × 10 ×
385) 4125)
Store delivery 16,500 41,250 1,37,500
(` 50 × 330 (` 50 × 825 (` 50 × 2750
deliveries) deliveries) deliveries)
Cartons 99,000 66,000 44,000
dispatched ( ` 1× 300 ( ` 1 × 80 ( ` 1 × 16
cartons × 300 cartons × 825 cartons × 2,750
deliveries) deliveries) deliveries)
Shelf stocking 15,840 7,920 4,400
(` 16 × 330 (` 16 × 825 (` 16 × 2,750
deliveries × 3 deliveries × 0.6 deliveries × 0.1
Av. hrs.) Av. hrs) Av. hrs)
Operating cost 1,62,910 1,90,410 4,74,650

(iv) Challenges faced in assigning total operating cost of ` 8,27,970:

- Choosing an appropriate cost driver for activity area.
- Developing a reliable data base for the chosen cost driver.
- Deciding, how to handle costs that may be common across several
activities.
- Choice of the time period to compute cost rates per cost driver.
- Behavioural factors.

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 5.42 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

3. (i) Statement of Operating income and Operating income as a

percentage of revenues for each product line
(When support costs are allocated to product lines on the basis of cost of
goods sold of each product)
Soft Fresh Packaged Total (`)
Drinks (`) Produce Foods (`)
(`)
Revenues: (A) 39,67,500 1,05,03,000 60,49,500 2,05,20,000
Cost of Goods sold 30,00,000 75,00,000 45,00,000 1,50,00,000
(COGS): (B)
Support cost (30% of 9,00,000 22,50,000 13,50,000 45,00,000
COGS): (C)
(Refer working notes)
Total cost: (D) = {(B) + 39,00,000 97,50,000 58,50,000 1,95,00,000
(C)}
Operating income: E= 67,500 7,53,000 1,99,500 10,20,000
{(A)-(D)}
Operating income as a 1.70% 7.17% 3.30% 4.97%
percentage of revenues:
(E/A) × 100)

Working notes:
1. Total support cost:

(`)
Bottles returns 60,000
Ordering 7,80,000
Delivery 12,60,000
Shelf stocking 8,64,000
Customer support 15,36,000
Total support cost 45,00,000

2. Percentage of support cost to cost of goods sold (COGS):

Total support cost
= ×100
Total cost of goods sold

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.43

` 45,00,000
= ×100 = 30%
` 1,50,00,000
3. Cost for each activity cost driver:

Activity Total cost Cost Cost driver rate

(1) (`) allocation (4)=[(2)÷(3)]
(2) base
(3)
Ordering 7,80,000 1,560 purchase ` 500 per
orders purchase order
Delivery 12,60,000 3,150 ` 400 per delivery
deliveries
Shelf-stocking 8,64,000 8,640 hours ` 100 per stocking
hour
Customer 15,36,000 15,36,000 ` 1 per item sold
support items sold
(ii) Statement of Operating income and Operating income as a
percentage of revenues for each product line
(When support costs are allocated to product lines using an activity-
based costing system)
Soft Fresh Packaged Total
drinks Produce Food
(`) (`) (`) (`)
Revenues: (A) 39,67,500 1,05,03,000 60,49,500 2,05,20,000
Cost & Goods sold 30,00,000 75,00,000 45,00,000 1,50,00,000
Bottle return costs 60,000 0 0 60,000
Ordering cost* 1,80,000 4,20,000 1,80,000 7,80,000
(360:840:360)
Delivery cost* 1,20,000 8,76,000 2,64,000 12,60,000
(300:2190:660)
Shelf stocking cost* 54,000 5,40,000 2,70,000 8,64,000
(540:5400:2700)
Customer Support cost* 1,26,000 11,04,000 3,06,000 15,36,000
(1,26,000:11,04,000:3,06,000)

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 5.44 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Total cost: (B) 35,40,000 1,04,40,000 55,20,000 1,95,00,000

Operating income C:{(A)- (B)} 4,27,500 63,000 5,29,500 10,20,000
Operating income as a % of 10.78% 0.60% 8.75% 4.97%
revenues

* Refer to working note 3

4. Working note:
Computation of revenues (at listed price), discount, cost of goods sold
and customer level operating activities costs:
Customers
A B C D E
Cases sold: (a) 4,680 19,688 1,36,800 71,550 8,775
Revenues (at 5,05,440 21,26,304 1,47,74,400 77,27,400 9,47,700
listed price)
(`): (b)
{(a) × ` 108)}
Discount - 35,438 12,31,200 2,57,580 94,770
(`): (c) (19,688 (1,36,800 (71,550 (8,775
{(a) × cases × cases × cases × cases ×
Discount per ` 1.80) ` 9) ` 3.60) ` 10.80)
case}
Cost of goods 4,21,200 17,71,920 1,23,12,000 64,39,500 7,89,750
sold (`) : (d)
{(a) × ` 90}
Customer level operating activities costs
Order taking 11,250 18,750 22,500 18,750 22,500
costs (`):
(No. of
purchase ×
`750)
Customer 1,200 1,800 3,600 1,200 1,800
visits costs (`)
(No. of
customer
visits ×
` 600)

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.45

Delivery 1,150 1,035 1,725 2,300 3,450

vehicles travel (5.75 x (5.75 x 30 x (5.75 x 60x 5) (5.75 x 40 x (5.75 x 20
costs (`) 10x 20) 6) 10) x 30)
(` 5.75 per
km)
(Kms travelled
by delivery
vehicles ×
` 5.75 per
km.)
Product 17,550 73,830 5,13,000 2,68,313 32,906
handling
costs (`)
{(a) ×` 3.75}
Cost of - - - - 2,250
expediting
deliveries (`)
{No. of
expedited
deliveries × `
2,250}
Total cost of 31,150 95,415 5,40,825 2,90,563 62,906
customer
level
operating
activities (`)

(i) Computation of Customer level operating income

Customers
A (`) B (`) C (`) D (`) E (`)
Revenues 5,05,440 21,26,304 1,47,74,400 77,27,400 9,47,700
(At list price)
(Refer to
working note)
Less: Discount - 35,438 12,31,200 2,57,580 94,770
(Refer to
working note)
Revenue 5,05,440 20,90,866 1,35,43,200 74,69,820 8,52,930
(At actual

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 5.46 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

price)
Less: Cost of 4,21,200 17,71,920 1,23,12,000 64,39,500 7,89,750
goods sold
(Refer to
working note)
Gross margin 84,240 3,18,946 12,31,200 10,30,320 63,180
Less: 31,150 95,415 5,40,825 2,90,563 62,906
Customer
level
operating
activities costs
(Refer to
working note)
Customer 53,090 2,23,531 6,90,375 7,39,757 274
level
operating
income
Comment on the results:
Customer D is the most profitable customer. D’s profits are even higher than
C (whose revenue is the highest) despite having only 52.30% of the unit
volume of customer C. The main reason is that C receives a discount of ` 9
per case while customer D receives only a ` 3.60 discount per case.
Customer E is the least profitable. The profits of E is even less than A (whose
revenue is least) Customer E received a discount of ` 10.80 per case, makes
more frequent orders, requires more customer visits and requires more
delivery kms. in comparison with customer A.
(ii) Insight gained by reporting both the list selling price and the actual
selling price for each customer:
Separate reporting of both-the listed and actual selling prices enables Alpha
Ltd. to examine which customer has received what discount per case, whether
the discount received has any relationship with the sales volume. The data
given below provides us with the following information;

Sales volume Discount per case (`)

C (1,36,800 cases) 9.00
D (71,550 cases) 3.60

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.47

B (19,688 cases) 1.80

E (8,775 cases) 10.80
A (4,680 cases) 0
The above data clearly shows that the discount given to customers per case has a
direct relationship with sales volume, except in the case of customer E. The reasons
for ` 10.80 discount per case for customer E should be explored.
5. (i) Traditional Absorption Costing
BABYSOF BABYSOFT BABYSOFT Total
T- Gold - Pearl - Diamond
(a) Production of 4,000 3,000 2,000 9,000
soaps (Units)
(b) Direct labour 30 40 60 -
(minutes)
(c) Direct labour 2,000 2,000 2,000 6,000
hours (a × b)/60 minutes
Overhead rate per direct labour hour:
= Budgeted overheads  Budgeted labour hours
= ` 1,98,000  6,000 hours
= ` 33 per direct labour hour
Unit Costs:
BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT-
Gold (`) Pearl (`) Diamond (`)
Direct Costs:
- Direct Labour 5.00 6.67 10.00
 10×30   10×40   10×60 
     
 60   60   60 
- Direct Material 167.50 215.50 248.50
(Refer working note1)
Production Overhead: 16.50 22.00 33.00
 33×30   33×40   33×60 
     
 60   60   60 
Total unit costs 189.00 244.17 291.50

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 5.48 COST AND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

Number of units 4,000 3,000 2,000

Total costs 7,56,000 7,32,510 5,83,000

Working note-1
Calculation of Direct material cost

BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT-

Gold (`) Pearl (`) Diamond (`)
120.00 165.00 195.00
Essential oils  200×60   300×55   300×65 
     
 100   100   100 
40.00 40.00 40.00
Cocoa Butter  200×20   200×20   200×20 
     
 100   100   100 
Filtered water 4.50 4.50 4.50
 15×30   15×30   15×30 
     
 100   100   100 
Chemicals 3.00 6.00 9.00
 30×10   50×12   60×15 
     
 100   100   100 
Total costs 167.50 215.50 248.50

(ii) Activity Based Costing

BABYSOFT- Gold BABYSOFT- Pearl BABYSOFT- Diamond Total
Quantity (units) 4,000 3,000 2,000 -
Weight per unit 108 106 117 -
(grams) {(60×0.8)+20+30+10} {(55×0.8)+20+30+12} {(65×0.8)+20+30+15}
Total weight 4,32,000 3,18,000 2,34,000 9,84,000
(grams)
Direct labour 30 40 60 -
(minutes)
Direct labour 2,000 2,000 2,000 6,000
hours  4,000×30   3,000×40   2,000×60 
     
 60   60   60 

© The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India

 ACTIVITY BASED COSTING 5.49

Machine 5 5 6 -
operations per
unit
Total operations 20,000 15,000 12,000 47,000
Forklifting rate per gram = ` 58,000  9,84,000 grams
= ` 0.06 per gram
Supervising rate per direct = ` 60,000  6,000 hours
labour hour = ` 10 per labour hour
Utilities rate per machine = ` 80,000  47,000 machine
operations operations
= ` 1.70 per machine operations
Unit Costs under ABC:

BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT- BABYSOFT-

Gold (`) Pearl (`) Diamond
(` )
Direct Costs:
- Direct Labour 5.00 6.67 10.00
- Direct material 167.50 215.50 248.50
Production Overheads:
Forklifting cost 6.48 6.36 7.02
(0.06  108) (0.06  106) (0.06  117)

Supervising cost 5.00 6.67 10.00

 10×30   10×40   10×60 
     
 60   60   60 
Utilities 8.50 8.50 10.20
(1.70  5) (1.70  5) (1.70  6)
Total unit costs 192.48 243.70 285.72
Number of units 4,000 3,000 2,000
Total costs 7,69,920 7,31,100 5,71,440

(iii) Comments: The difference in the total costs under the two systems is
due to the differences in the overheads borne by each of the products.
The Activity Based Costs appear to be more accurate.

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