SLC | S21W3 | Costs for entrepreneurs - Costing methods.

ruthjoe -
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Hello teacher

What are costing methods and what is their importance?

Costing methods are simply the various procedures or systems used for the calculation of the total cost of production of a product or products or even service rendered.

These calculations involves making estimation, analyzing and recording operations involved when a particular product was made.

Some costing methods used by companies and entrepreneurs includes the following

Process Costing

This is a costing method used for tracking expenses made directly on products during the manufacturing process.

Batch Costing

This is another method of costing used to collect cost paid when items or service is manufactured in groups.

Contract Costing

This is a costing method just as the name implies contract. It is used to collect cost online with contract done with a customer.

Job Costing

This costing method involves the calculation of costs in projects and jobs done by individuals. Direct and indirect costs are inclusive when calculating job costing.

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Importance of Costing Methods

It is no longer news that the concept of pricing is very crucial for any business. Costing Method is important in the area of pricing because it helps business owners set accurate price for their goods and services, making sure loss is not made after their cost is calculated.

The use of cost methods helps in making sure that budgets of companies and entrepreneurs are managed properly ensuring that they make realistic financial plans.

Using the right costing method in business helps us make decisions by producing the required data needed like the kind of market the business owners should enter into, the rate of production and if the business owner should stop producing a product after finding out that profit wasn't made.

One more importance of using costing method is that it helps business owners check their income comparing it with their expenses made by so doing, business owners can be able to identify the areas they did well like making profit and the areas they didn't do well like making losses and making adjustments.

Explain the difference between the job order and process costing methods
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Job orderProcess Costing
Used by business owners who provide services or produce service based on specified order issued by customers like wedding cakeused for the mass production of products like ice cream production
It is used to cost individual productsused to cost products in bulk
Gives an accurate costing result for products that are heterogenousProcess Costing gives accurate costing result for homogeneous products.
Cash flows directly to jobs allocatedCash flows through several process before it is allocated
The end product of inventory is valued at actual costEnd product of inventory is valued at average cost per unit.
Labour hour is tracked per joblabour is tracked by department
Research and explain, to the best of your understanding, two costing methods different from those explained in this class
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Standing Costing Method

Standard costing method is used by business owners to make estimation of production cost make plans for their budgets and keep he cost in check. Usually,direct materials, labour and overhead manufacturing are compared to the actual cost.

Types of standard costing method
There are three types of standard costing method and they include

Benefits of Standard costing method

To get standard costs of production, All estimated cost for direct materials, labour and overhead manufacturing are added.

Absorption Costing Method

Absorption Costing Method is used where all manufacturing cost of a product is calculated to its full cost. Absorption cost comprises of all direct cost and indirect cost which can include direct labour, materials , rent, insurance and manufacturing overhead.

It is majorly used to to understand the full cost of product.

Types of Absorption Costing Method

There are 2 types of Absorption Costing Method

Benefits of Absorption Costing Method

To get the Absorption Cost of product, overhead cost is divided by the number of labour hours of production.

Perform the costing by work orders, according to what was explained for a cake manufacturing business

To calculate this I will put into consideration Direct cost of materials, Direct labour and over head manufacturing cost.

To find the Direct cost of materials I would list the materials needed for baking the cake and their prices. They include

Materialscost
Flour$25
Crate of eggs$15
Baking soda$7
Milk flavor$5
Butter$10
Vanilla mixture$5
Total$67

Next is to calculate Direct labour.
If hourly rate for labour is $5 and it took 6 hours to make the cake. Direct labour will be= 6×5=30
Direct labour=$30

Overhead manufacturing cost
This includes electricity used while producing the cake.
Let's say Monthly expenses for electricity= $150
Total cake made = 10

To calculate overhead cost for this cake = Total monthly expenses ÷ total cake made
150÷10=$15

Total production cost of cake = Total of Direct materials + Total of Direct labour + Overhead cost.

CostAmount
Total Direct materials$67
Total Direct labour$30
Total Overhead cost$15
Total production cost$380

Costing by work order for the cake manufacturing business= $380

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