7.3: Flow of Costs (Process Costing)
Learning Outcomes
- Explain the flow of costs in a process costing system
The flow of costs in the process costing system is similar to in a job-costing system, but let’s review with our Ultimate Planner example:
In the process planning we will cost by process. Process 1 involved preparing the raw materials for printing, process 2 is the actual printing, and process 3 is packaging the planners to be moved to finished goods inventory. Costing is simpler in this system because rather than having to prepare a costing sheet for many products, we only need to do costing for three departments or processes.
We start with the basic inputs:
- Raw materials
- Wages
- Manufacturing overhead
Manufacturing overhead will be estimated, just as in the job costing method, but will need to be recorded as incurred. The clearing account will be used to accumulate the actual costs, and a reconciliation will be done at the end of each period.
A processing department is a unit where work is performed on a product and where materials, labor or overhead are added to the product. In the case of our planner, we first add the raw materials, then we add labor to process the raw materials, next conclude with additional labor to package the finished product to prepare it for shipment. These will be the three processes used for costing. Each business will have different processing departments, depending on the product they are making.
Each of these processing departments will be a work-in-process center. So a job costing system may have only one work-in-process, while a process costing system will have several. In the Ultimate Planner example, there will be three WIP accounts.
Raw materials, labor and overhead can be added during any process. So the costs in Process 2 will include everything happening in that process, plus the costs that are attached to the partially completed product transferred in from Process 1. These are called transferred-in costs.
Practice Questions