1. 9 Responsibility Accounting Douglas Cloud Pepperdine University
Prepared by
Douglas Cloud Pepperdine University

2. After reading this chapter, you should be able to:
Objectives
Define goal congruence and explain its relationship to control and performance evaluation.
Identify the types of responsibility centers and explain the differences among them.
Determine the positive and negative aspects of specific criteria used for evaluating the performance of responsibility centers.
After reading this chapter, you should be able to:
Continued

3. Objectives
Calculate contribution margin variances and explain their significance.
Describe the pros and cons of including cost allocation in performance reports.
Describe some approaches to allocating costs to responsibility centers.
Explain how cost allocations can create ethical problems.

4. A major objective of management control is to encourage goal congruence, which means that as people work to achieve their own goals, they also work to accomplish the company’s goals.

5. Responsibility Centers
A responsibility center is an activity, such as a department, that a manager controls.
Types of Responsibility Centers
Cost centers
Revenue centers
Profit centers
Investment centers

6. Responsibility Centers
A cost center is a segment whose manager is responsible for costs, but not revenues. A cost center can be relatively small.
Examples:
A manufacturing cell
The office of the chief executive
The legal department

7. Responsibility Centers
A revenue center is a segment whose manager is responsible for earning revenues, but not for the costs of generating revenues.
Examples:
Hospitals
Marketing departments 15 8

8. Responsibility Centers
A profit center is a segment whose manager is responsible for revenues as well as costs.
An investment center is a segment whose manager is responsible not only for revenues and costs, but also for the investment required to generate profits. 17 9

9. Transfer Price
A transfer price is the price that one center charges another center within the company. 18 10

10. Performance Evaluation Criteria
Selecting criteria to measure and evaluate performance is important because the criteria influence managers’ actions. The most common deficiencies in performance measures are:
using a single measure that emphasizes only one objective of the organization; and
using measures that either misrepresent or fail to reflect the organization’s objectives or the employee’s responsibilities. 21 11

11. The Balanced Scorecard
An approach known as the balanced scorecard has become popular recently. This approach extends performance evaluation from merely looking at financial results to formally incorporating measures that look at customer satisfaction, internal business processes, and the learning and growth potential of the organization.

12. The Balanced Scorecard
The balanced scorecard asks four basic questions:
1. How do customers see us? (the customer perspective)
2. What must we excel at? (the internal business process perspective)
3. Can we continue to improve and create value? (the learning and growth perspective)
4. How do we look to stockholders? (the financial perspective)

13. Responsibility Reports for Cost Centers
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Supervisor of Work Station 106—Drill Press
Materials $ 3,200 $(80 ) $ 12,760 $ 110
Direct labor 14, ,
Supervision 1,100 (50 ) 4,140 (78 )
Power, supplies, miscellaneous ,
Totals $19,410 $ 64 $107,620 $1,004
Report to Supervisor of Fabrication Department 21 11

14. Responsibility Reports for Cost Centers
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Supervisor of Fabrication Department
Station 106—Drill Press $19,410 $ $107,620 $1,004
Station 107—Grinding 17, ,430 (213 )
Station 108—Cutting 23, , ,227
Total work stations $60,698 $1,062 $318,506 $2,018
Continued

15. Responsibility Reports for Cost Centers
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Supervisor of Fabrication Department
Departmental costs (common to work stations):
General supervision $12,634 $ $ 71,234 $
Cleaning 6, ,
Other 1, (67 ) , (108 )
Total $81,347 $1,319 $432,184 $2,672
Report to Manager of Factory

16. Responsibility Reports for Cost Centers
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Manager of Factory
Fabrication department $ 81,347 $1,319 $ 432,184 $2,672
Milling department 91,234 (2,034 ) 405,190 (4,231 )
Assembly department 107, ,240 1,346
Casting department , (433 ) ,
Total departments $358,304 $ (294 ) $1,645,724 $ 476
Continued

17. Responsibility Reports for Cost Centers
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
General factory costs (common to departments):
Engineering $ 14,235 $261 $ 81,340 $842
Heat and light 8, ,
Building depreciation 3, ,400 0
General administration , ,
Total factory costs $407,484 $ 485 $1,919,974 $2,984

18. Responsibility Reports for Profit Centers (000s)
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Product Manager—Appliances, European Region
Sales $122.0 $ $387.0 $ 3.2
Variable costs:
Production $ $ $150.7 $ 5.9
Selling and administrative
Total variable costs $ $ $189.4 $ 7.8
Contribution margin $ $ (3.1 ) $197.6 $(4.6 )
Direct fixed costs $ (1.2 ) (3.1 )
Product margin $ $ (1.9 ) $ $ (1.5 )
To report to manage—European Region

19. Responsibility Reports for Profit Centers (000s)
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Manager—European Region
Profit margins:
Appliances $26.3 $(1.9 ) $ $(1.5 )
Industrial equipment
Tools (2.0 )
Total product margins $82.0 $ 2.4 $292.7 $ 3.8
Regional expenses (common to all product lines) (1.3 )
Regional margin $63.5 $ 1.6 $231.5 $ 5.1
Report to Executive Vice President

20. Responsibility Reports for Profit Centers (000s)
Current Month Year to Date
Over Over
Budget (Under) Budget (Under)
Report to Executive Vice President
Regional margins:
European $ 63.5 $ $ $ 5.1
Asian 78.1 (4.3 ) (8.2 )
North American (3.2 ) (9.6 )
Total regional margins $353.4 $ (5.9 ) $1, $(12.7 )
Corporate expenses (common to all regions)
Corporate profit $266.3 $ (7.3 ) $ $(15.8 )

21. Analyzing Contribution Margin Variance
Profit depends on several factors, including selling prices, sales volumes, and costs. Budgeted and actual profits rarely coincide because prices, volume, and costs can (and do) vary from expectations. To plan and to evaluate previous decisions, managers need to know the sources of variances.

22. Contribution Margin Variance Example
Horton Company expected to sell 20,000 units at $20 with unit variable costs of $12. Horton actually sold 21,000 units at $19.
Budgeted Actual Difference
Sales $400,000 $399,000 $(1,000)
Variable costs 240, ,000 (12,000)
Contribution margin $160,000 $147,000 $(13,000)

23. Sales Volume Variance
The sales volume variance is the difference between (1) the contribution margin the company would have earned selling the budgeted number of units at the budgeted unit contribution margin and (2) the contribution margin it would have earned selling the actual number of units at the budgeted unit contribution margin.
Sales = budgeted contribution x (actual unit – budgeted unit) volume variance margin per unit sales sales
$8,000 = $8 x (21, – 20,000)

24. Sales Price Variance
The sales price variance is the difference between (1) actual total contribution margin and (2) total contribution margin that would have been earned at the actual volume and budgeted unit contribution margin.
Sale price variance = units sold x (actual price – budgeted price)
$21,000 F = 21, x ($19 - $20)

25. Cost Allocations on Responsibility Reports
Operating departments in manufacturers work directly on products. Operating departments in a retail company serve customers directly.
Service departments (service centers) provide services to operating departments and to one another. Examples: human resources, accounting, and building security. 30 19

26. Arguments Against Allocating Indirect Fixed Costs
1. Because indirect fixed costs are not controllable by the users, allocating them violates the principle of controllability.
2. Including allocated costs on performance reports could lead to poor decisions because managers will treat the costs as differential.

27. Allocation Methods and Effects: Allocating Actual Costs Based on Actual Use
This method is flawed in two respects.
It allocates actual costs rather than budgeted costs. Allocating actual costs passes the inefficiencies (or efficiencies) of one department to the next.
It allocates fixed costs based on use. 34 21

28. Allocation Example
Raleigh Company has one service department, Maintenance, and two operating departments, Fabrication and Assembly. Data for the departments follow:
Operating Hours of Maintenance Service Used
Department: Budgeted Actual
Fabrication , ,000
Assembly , ,000
Total , ,000
Maintenance Department Costs for Year:
Budgeted Actual
Variable (budgeted, $5.00; actual, $5.10) $200,000 $153,000
Fixed , ,500
Totals $275,000 $232,500 22

29. Allocation Example Allocations would be:
Actual per-hour cost of providing the service = = $7.75/hr.
$232,500
30,000 hours
Allocations would be:
Fabrication (20,000 x $7.75) $155,000
Assembly (10,000 x $7.75) ,500
Total maintenance costs allocated $232,500 23

30. Methods to Allocate Service Department Costs (Appendix)
Direct method
Step method
Reciprocal method 40 24

31. Direct Method Illustrated in the chapter material
Direct method ignores services that service depts. Provide to other service depts.

32. Step-Down Method Also called: step-down allocation or step method
Recognizes that service depts. Provide services for other service depts. As well as operating depts.
Result: costs of all service depts., except first to be allocated, will reflect their shares of the costs of some other service depts.

33. Reciprocal Method Also called simultaneous method
Recognizes the services that each service dept. renders to other service depts.
1st – the percentages that each service dept. receives from the other are decided upon.
2nd – adjusted costs are calculated – to recognize that depts. Provide service to each other.
Finally – these adjusted costs are allocated to the operating depts. Using the percentages computed.

34. Chapter 9
The End