Cost accounting and controlling - with modern, effective tools
Our well-founded theoretical background and especially practical experience we have gained will pay off for you. Be it in the conception and introduction of modern cost accounting systems or in the use of controlling instruments. We develop a cost and activity accounting system tailored to your specific requirements and needs - at a reasonable expense.
In doing so, we consider every economically significant process in your company under these three aspects:
Liquidity
All entrepreneurial activities are analysed with regard to whether they lead to payment transactions - because income and expenditure are not necessarily relevant in determining cash flows. The aim of these considerations is to maintain the solvency of your company in the short and long term and thus its economic survival.
Profit and loss
When determining the profit, the expenses are compared to the earnings. Both sides are indirectly and partly directly related to cost accounting: Not all expenses are Costs and not all earnings results from the output of goods and services. For accounting purposes, for example, a distinction is made between “neutral expenses” and “neutral earnings”.
Costs and activity
In cost and activity accounting, only those events are recorded that directly represent an operational performance - irrespective of whether the respective operation has led to an expenditure or not. For implicit costs, it is also irrelevant whether the operation was relevant for the profit and loss account. The only decisive factors are that
- the costs can be allocated to a cost unit (= costing),
- the allocation is carried out in accordance with the principle of causality, and
- the results of cost accounting allow conclusions to be made about the economic efficiency of the company’s output of goods and services.
REFA International AG is your partner for the selection and implementation of cost and activity accounting systems and controlling instruments tailored to your needs.
There is no question that cost and activity accounting is one of the most important information systems of companies. Yet it is not perfect: A major weakness lies in the allocation of overhead costs to a product according to the principle of causality. For example, if variable costs are reduced, this inevitably leads to an increase in the share of fixed overheads in the cost of sales. And these overhead costs are distributed to all products as correspondingly high overhead surcharges according to classical cost accounting.
The share of services in the product life cycle - as indirect value creation - or product differentiation or individualisation, which was given little consideration in the past, is still underestimated. Both make accurate product costing difficult.
With the introduction of modern cost accounting systems such as standard or process costing or target costing, these weak spots can be eliminated.
We use the following tools for you
- Cost centre and cost-unit accounting (Expense distribution sheet)
- Break-even analysis
- Contribution costing
- Short term profit and loss account
- Process cost calculation
- Capital investment appraisal
- Sales area analysis according to cost contribution and contribution margins
- Ordering quantity optimisation
- Batch size optimisation
- ROI and profitability analyses
- Overhead costs analysis
- Review of manufacturing costs
Coaching and training - so the know-how stays with you
We train your staff in our methodology and coach them on current issues. This enables them to use the tools presented efficiently and to adapt and further develop them to the needs and requirements of your company. The targeted knowledge transfer and the “learning-by-doing” approach in the various work processes have a lasting effect and create a win-win situation: The employees benefit from the know-how they gain and your company, including the entire staff, from the sustainably increased economic success.
Bettina Dirks
