Question

The operations vice president of Security Home Bank has been interested in investigating the efficiency of the bank's operations. She has been particularly concerned about the costs of handling routine transactions at the bank and would like to compare these costs at the bank's various branches. If the branches with the most efficient operations can be identified, their methods can be studied and then replicated elsewhere. While the bank maintains meticulous records of wages and other costs, there has been no attempt thus far to show how those costs are related to the various services provided by the bank. The operations vice president has asked your help in conducting an activity-based costing study of bank operations. In particular, she would like to know the cost of opening an account, the cost of processing deposits and withdrawals, and the cost of processing other customer transactions. The Westfield branch of Security Home Bank has submitted the following cost data for last year: Teller wages Assistant branch manager salary Branch manager salary Total $ 152,000 74,000 93,000 $ 319,000 Virtually all other costs of the branch-rent, depreciation, utilities, and so on-are organization-sustaining costs that cannot be meaningfully assigned to individual customer transactions such as depositing checks. In addition to the cost data above, the employees of the Westfield branch have been interviewed concerning how their time was distributed last year across the activities included in the activity-based costing study. The results of those interviews appear below: Distribution of Resource Consumption Across Activities Processing Opening Deposits and Accounts Withdrawals Teller wages 5% 65% Assistant branch manager salary 12% Branch manager salary 5% 0% Processing Other Customer Transactions 20% 21% 17% Other Activities 10% 59% 78% Totals 100% 100% 100% The manager of the Westfield branch of Security Home Bank has provided the following data concerning the transactions of the branch during the past year:

Answer 1

	Opening Accounts	Processing Deposits and Withdrawals	Processing Other Customer Transactions	Other Activities	Total
Teller wages	7600	98800	30400	15200	152000
Assistant branch manager salary	5920	8880	15540	43660	74000
Branch manager salary	4650	0	15810	72540	93000
Total	18170	107680	61750	131400	319000
Activity cost pool	Activity rate
Opening Accounts	100.94	per account opened	=18170/180
Processing Deposits and Withdrawals	2.22	per deposit or withdrawal	=107680/48500
Processing Other Customer Transactions	53.70	per Other Customer Transaction	=61750/1150