Case Study: Williams Ltd ~ Williams Ltd manufactures iron gates to individual customers' specifications. The company use the tender process to obtain work, where the company responds to an invitation to submit a competitive bid. Over the last few months, Williams Lid. has been very quiet, and the managing director, Jack Jones, is concerned that the business will fail if it does not improve its success rate with tenders. The company has two production departments, Bending and Welding, and the production requirements for individual jobs can differ significantly. Some jobs require extensive bending with little welding; others require little bending with a lot of welding.~ The following table describes the results of the five bids that the company submitted last month. The numbers in brackets after losses indicate where the company ranked in the bid process: Job Direct labour Direct labour Estimated Overhead hours in hours in direct labour cost of bid Won/lost Bending Welding- hours 1,200( 300 1,500- $4, 125 Lost (5thy 300- 1,200 1,500- $4, 125 Won 1,400- 100- 1,500 $4,125 Lost (3rdy 100- 1,400- 1,500( $4, 125 Won 750- 750- 1,500 $4,125 Lost (2nd) The pattern of resource usage implied in the above table has persisted for several months. The company uses a pre-determined plant-wide overhead rate based on practical capacity, which is measured in direct labour hours. The budgeted overhead for the year for the Bending Department is $54,000 (including $18,000 fixed and $36,000 variable), and for the Welding Department it is $144,000 (including $36,000 fixed and $108,000 variable). Each department has a monthly practical capacity of 3 000 direct labour hours