UNIT CODE:CMA202
UNIT NAME:COST ACCOUNTING
Assignment One Information
Semester 1 2013
Assessment 35%
Submission Requirements.
This assignment may be submitted at or before Friday Study Week 10.
Assignments are to be submitted by one of the following means;
DO NOT LODGE BY FAX nor EMAIL nor at LECTURER’S OFFICE
KEEP A COPY
· The assignment must be lodged on or before the due date indicated in the assignment details.
· Submit your Assignment using either a PDF or MSWord file format1 .
· The assignment submitted must be accompanied by a signed student declaration as provided for on the CMA202 Assignment Cover Sheet templates (as provided on Learnline2).
· The assignment submitted must include the completed coversheet for this unit (as provided on Learnline), placed at the front of the document submitted.1 (Failure to include a signed coversheet may result in your assignment lodgement being rejected.)
· The assignment must conform to the requirements set out in this assignment
· The assignment must be lodged online via the CMA202 Learnline Assignment Lodgement link on the CMA202 Learnline site. Ensure your file is named using a file naming convention that allows the lecturer to identify to whom it belongs. Failure to use an acceptable file naming convention may result in your assignment lodgement being rejected.
· DO NOT LODGE VIA EMAILor FAX – assignments lodged by email or fax will not be accepted.
· KEEP A COPY – Ensure you have a copy of the assignment lodged. If you have submittedassessment work electronically please make sure you have a backup copy.
· Assignment lodgements will be acknowledged by the lecturer on the CDU CMA202 Learnline site within 72 hours of receipt. It is the students responsibility to ensure that the lecturer has received (and acknowledged receiving) the assignment.
1 Instructions for creating PDF documents and/or combining documents of different formats are provided on the Learnline site.
2 DO NOTuse the CDU generic coversheet.
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Coversheet
The assignment should be accompanied by a standard assignment cover sheet (provided separately on the CDU CMA202 Learnline site) and preferably be typed. The student declaration must be signed (or acknowledged electronically3)- failure to sign (or acknowledge electronically) the declaration may mean that the assignment will not be accepted. DO NOT USE the generic Assignment Cover Sheet provided by External Student Support (ESS) for the submission of hard copy assignments by external students.
Assignment Checklist
An assignment checklist has been provided on the CDU CMA202 Learnline site,to assist students who wish to ensure that the various submission requirements have been met.
Format
The assignment may be completed manually, or with the use of an electronic spreadsheet, word processing software or with the use of accounting software. Marks may be deducted for illegible or partially illegible papers. If completed using multiple file formats or manually, the documents must be combined into one document, preferably in PDF format4.
Resubmission
As a general rule resubmission of assessment items is NOT possible, however the Lecturer may ask for resubmission if it is deemed appropriate. Details for such resubmission will be made available by the Lecturer if and when the situation occurs.
Preparation guidelines
Assignment preparation guidelines are provided on the CDU CMA202 Learnline site.
Students are required to comply with these requirements.
Assignment preparation and presentation guidelines, instructions on lodgement of the assignment and the required coversheet and declaration, are all provided with and/or separately to this document and are available on the CMA202 CDU Learnline site.
FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH THESE REQUIREMENTS WILL RESULT IN YOUR ASSIGNMENT BEING REJECTED WITH SUBSEQUENT LOSS OF MARKS.
University Plagiarism policy
Plagiarism is the unacknowledged use of material written or produced by others or a rework of your own material. All sources of information and ideas used in assignments must be referenced. This applies whether the information is from a book, journal article, the internet, or a previous essay you wrote or the assignment of a friend. Plagiarism policy is available at:
3 The document has been designed so that student can acknowledge the declaration by selecting an option at the signature space.
4 Instructions for creating PDF documents and/or combining documents of different formats are provided on the Learnline site.
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Faculty of Law, Education, Business and Arts
Higher Education, Internal and External
CMA202_ASSIGN_113_CASE.DOCX
EXTENSIONS AND LATE LODGEMENTS
LATE ASSIGNMENTS WILL GENERALLY NOT BE ACCEPTED UNLESS AN EXTENSION TO THE DUE DATE HAS BEEN GRANTED BY THE HEAD OF SCHOOL.
Exceptions will only be made where assignments are late due to special circumstances that are supported by documentary evidence, and may be subject to a penalty of 4% of assignment marks per day. Partially completed assignments will be accepted with appropriate loss of marks for the incomplete portion.
Should students foresee potential difficulties with submission of assessment items, they should contact the lecturer immediately the difficulties come to notice, to discuss suitable arrangements etc for the submission of those assessment times. An Application for Assignment Extension or Special Consideration should be completed and provided to the Head of School, School of Law and Business.
This application form, explanation and instructions is available on the CMA202 CDU Learnline course site or direct from
Please note that it is now Faculty policy that all extension requests must be approved by the Head of School. The lecturer is no longer able to personally approve extension requests.
Leaving a request for an extension, special assessment or special consideration until the last moment, based on grounds that students could have reasonably been able to foresee, may result in the application being rejected.
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Higher Education, Internal and External
CMA202_ASSIGN_113_CASE.DOCX
REQUIRED:
Each student will take the role of a management accounting consultant and present your analysis and recommendations/conclusions. The paper should be written in fluent grammatical English. It should include a bibliography of referenced sources. Internet resources used should be acknowledged and fully referenced. Copies of internet materials used should be submitted separately (either in MSWord or PDF format) with the final paper. All references and sources must be properly acknowledged. A copy of the final paper should be retained by the author.
The case is rich in detail and management accounting issues. Whilst all the information provided is relevant to a greater or lesser extent, students could focus on the Activity Based Costing System and the questions asked. For example exhibits 2 and 3 are peripheral to the expected analysis and are provided to provide some context. Exhibits 4, 7& 8 may be more relevant to the analysis and exhibits 1, 5, 6 and 9 would be the most relevant overall. Student analysis and discussion should focus on the rationale for and impact of the split-cost accounting system, and, conclude with an open-ended discussion of the applicability of the approach to more complex comprehensive health care institutions and/or hospitals.
Case Study Analysis
1. Analyse the MEEI Case and determine how the MEEI administrators might use the information from the Activity Based Costing System?
Written Report or Essay
2. Based on your analysis of the MEEI Case (as per requirement 1), provide a report that answers the following questions:
a. What problems arose with the old per-diem costing system? How would the new Activity Based Costing System remedy these problems? How might it affect managements decisions in respect to patient mix?
b. What would be the difference between the budgeted 1977 routine care cost of the following procedures under the old accounting method and under the activity based costing system?
· a cataract operation;
· a tonsillectomy/adenoidectomy procedure;
· a laryngectomy and radical neck dissection.
What accounts for the differences? Are they significant?
Provide a schedule of supporting calculations to support your answer. Where appropriate, calculations should be to three decimal places.
c. Using the hypothetical data given by Ms. Arndt, how could a hospital using a per diem reimbursement lose revenue and how much revenue would it lose? In comparison would MEEI lose revenue using the Activity Based Costing System (the split-cost accounting system)? Provide schedules of supporting calculations to support your answer. These schedules would include a flexible budget based on Ms Arndts suggested initial level of hospital activity, the standard cost and standard charge (using the same markup used in Exhibit 5) using both the per diem method and the split-cost (ABC) method, and as a minimum, the three data sets provided in Exhibit 9. Whilst not specifically required, you may find it useful to provide a graph of the outcome of each of the data sets. Where appropriate calculations should be to three decimal places.
Research Activity
3. Undertake research into the relevant literature and provide a report on your findings on how an Activity Based Costing System might be implemented at a less specialised (i.e. general) hospital than MEEI. What kinds of implementation problems do you foresee and how would you avoid them?
In reporting on your findings you should;
· Describe and discuss the design of the Activity Based Costing System.
· Do other less specialised hospitals have the same design problems?
· Include in your description of the Activity Based Costing System;
· a definition of the products and the customers5 implicit in the system;
· the criteria for choosing cost drivers.
· What importance or relevance (if any) do you attach to the distinction between procedures and diagnoses?
· What bearing does this distinction have (if any) on the transferability of the MEEI system?
5 Hint! Consider who is actually paying the bills.
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CMA202_ASSIGN_113_CASE.DOCX
There is no single right answer to requirements 2 and 3 this case study, albeit that there are better solutions than others. Students should concentrate on the strength of their analysis and argument in presenting a solution. A lesser solution backed by strong, logical, well researched and well-presented analysis will achieve a similar grade to a better solution backed by similarly good analysis.6
The paper should be between 2,500 and 4,000 words7. The length of parts 2(a) to (c) is as required to answer the questions and the length of part 3 should be between 1,500 and 2,500 words. The paper may take the form of a report, or an essay. However the form is irrelevant provided that the information required is provided within the limits given.
If your report is completed using multiple file formats or manually, the documents must be combined into one document, preferably in PDF format8.
6 ie. Its the strength of the analysis that will affect the grade and not so much the solution itself.
7 The length of assignment is an indication of the depth of analysis that is required. It does not include appendices or calculations. The length of the assignment is provided only a guide and need not be adhered to exactly. The intention is thatstudents demonstrate that sufficient analysis is undertaken, without excessive workload.
8 Instructions for creating PDF documents and/or combining documents of different formats are provided on the Learnline site.
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Faculty of Law, Education, Business and Arts
Higher Education, Internal and External
CMA202_ASSIGN_113_CASE.DOCX
FEASIBLE METHODOLOGY9 IN ANSWERING CASE STUDY
1. Read the case study and the assignment questions carefully and answer only the questions asked.
2. Identify the relevant Management Accounting issues to be addressed in the case study.
3. Identify the relevant facts.
4. Relate the relevant facts to the Management Accounting issues identified (ie. for each relevant fact, answer the question “So What?”).
5. Summarise, form an opinion and/or suggest possible solutions based on your findings related to the relevant facts and issues.
6. Acknowledge all sources accurately and completely.
The paper should be properly referenced using a accepted reference technique10 accompanied by an appropriate11 bibliography and literature review.
7. It is important to note that more or excessive work than required is not necessarily seen as better. In many cases, work exceeding the required length will be penalised. Another point to note is that most assignments require you to argue a point of view or to demonstrate how you think about an issue; to, in other words, test your ability to analyse, diagnose, recommend and implement decisions. Many students confuse thinking and writing with collecting descriptive material. Descriptive material is important and indeed essential in most cases; it should be limited however to what is necessary and be in proportion to the other requirements of arguing and thinking. Too much descriptive material, no matter how well presented, does not make a good piece of work.
