Baulkham Hills Shire Council owns and operates an animal shelter that provides the following services:

1. housing and finding homes for stray and unwanted animals,

2. providing health care and nurturing services for the animals, and

3. pet training services.

The operations are undertaken in three different facilities each dedicated for its own purpose as below:

a) One is dedicated to housing animals waiting to be adopted.

b) The second facility houses veterinarian services.

c) The third, houses the director, his staff, and several dog trainers. This facility also has several large meeting rooms that are frequently used for classes given by the animal trainers.

The trainers work with all of the animals to ensure that they are relatively easy to manage. They also provide dog obedience classes for adopting families. Estimated annual costs for the animal shelter and its services are as follows:

Director and staff salaries- $120,000

Animal shelter employees' salaries- 200,000

Veterinarians and technicians - 300,000

Animal trainers - 80,000

Food and supplies- 250,000

Building-related costs - 400,000

On average, 150 animals per day are housed at the facility, or about 54,750 (150 x 365) animal days in total. The number of animals housed during the year totalled 9000. In addition, the trainers offer about 250 classes during the year. On average, 20 families attend each class. Last year the veterinarian clinic experienced 10000 animal visits.

You have been newly appointed as one of the Director's staff members and have been asked to set up an ABC system for the shelter so that the Director can better understand the cost for each of the shelter's services. You gather the following information:

Square footage for each facility:

Animal shelter- 10000 square feet

Director and training - 6000 square feet

Veterinarian clinic - 4000 square feet

Percentage of trainer time used in classes - 50%

Supplies used for veterinarian services - $150,000

REQUIRED: I have to make an Executive Report to advise the Director on the results of an analysis of the costing system and the introduction of an ABC system. Your report should include the following:

1. Show how you identified cost pools and assigned costs to them, considering the three cost objects of interest.

2. How did you determine a cost driver for each cost pool and explain your choice.

3. Calculate the allocation rates for each cost pool and cost driver. Interpret the allocation rate for each cost pool (i.e., explain what it means).

My report should be set out in an appropriate format under the following headings:

1. Executive summary - an overview of the important issues and their background, and providing a summary of your findings.

2. Analysis - details of the analysis undertake and the results. All calculations should be shown.

3. Findings - detail and justify your findings from the analysis. Take care to recognise and describe any limitations.

4. Action items/limitations - detail the limitations from the analysis. Identify potential areas for actions to be undertaken by the organisation.