Miami Valley Architects Inc. provides a wide range of engineering and architectural consulting services through its three branch offices in Columbus, Cincinnati, and Dayton, Ohio. The company allocates resources and bonuses to the three branches based on the net income of the period. The results of the firm$$s performance for the most recent year follows $($$ in thousands$)$:

$$

Columbus Cincinnati Dayton Total

Sales $ $1,500$ $ $1,419$ $ $1,067$ $ $3,986$

Less:

Direct labor $3823173171,016$

Direct materials $281421185887$

Overhead $7105895891,888$

Net income $ $127$ $ $92$ $ $(24)$ $ $195$

$$

Miami Valley accumulates overhead items in one overhead pool and allocates it to the branches based on direct labor dollars. For this year, the predetermined overhead rate was $$1\mathrm{.}859$ for every direct labor dollar incurred by an office. The overhead pool includes rent, depreciation, and taxes, regardless of which office incurred the expense. Some branch managers complain that the overhead allocation method forces them to absorb a portion of the overhead incurred by the other offices.

$$

Management is concerned with the recent operating results. During a review of overhead expenses, management noticed that many overhead items were clearly not correlated to the movement in direct labor dollars as previously assumed. Management decided that applying overhead based on activity$-$based costing and direct tracing wherever possible should provide a more accurate picture of the profitability of each branch.

$$

An analysis of the overhead revealed that the following dollars for rent, utilities, depreciation, and taxes could be traced directly to the office that incurred the overhead $($$ in thousands$)$:

$$

Columbus Cincinnati Dayton Total

Direct overhead $ $180$ $ $270$ $ $177$ $ $627$

$$

Activity pools and their corresponding cost drivers were determined from the accounting records and staff surveys as follows:

$$

General administration $ $409,000$

Project costing $48,000$

Accounts payable$/$receiving $139,000$

Accounts receivable $47,000$

Payroll$/$Mail sort and delivery $30,000$

Personnel recruiting $38,000$

Employee insurance processing $14,000$

Proposals $139,000$

Sales meetings$/$Sales aids $202,000$

Shipping $24,000$

Ordering $48,000$

Duplicating costs $46,000$

Blueprinting $77,000$

$ $1,261,000$

$$

Cost Driver Amount of Cost Driver Use by Location

Columbus Cincinnati Dayton

Direct labor cost $ $382,413$ $ $317,086$ $ $317,188$

Timesheet entries $6,0003,8003,500$

Vendor invoices $1,020850400$

Client invoices $58844496$

Employees $232618$

New hires $847$

Insurance claims filed $230260180$

Proposals $20025060$

Contracted sales $1,824,4391,399,617571,208$

Projects shipped $9912430$

Purchase orders $13511080$

Copies duplicated $162,500146,25065,000$

Blueprints $39,00031,20016,000$

Required:

$1.$What overhead costs should be assigned to each branch based on ABC concepts?

$2.$ What is the contribution of each branch before subtracting the results obtained in requirement $1?$

$3.$ What is the profitability of each branch office using ABC?