Job costing - entering your costs

To record costs for a job you should first click on 'Start job costing'. Typically you will enter a number of work dockets at a time, one after another. For that reason there are single character keyboard shortcuts for almost all choices in this program, to avoid the delay occasioned by switching from keyboard to mouse and back.

· Note that we cost the different parts separately. We recommend that you enter the costs of delivery and packing in part A.

· Also note that we need the job number, not the estimate number. If you are not using the community edition, this is probably on your jobsheet. If you are using the community edition, you will probably be using your own manual jobsheet, and you should make sure that the job number, which you can find at the foot of the job desktop for any confirmed job, is written conspicuously on it.

In this screen you first choose the task against which you want to record the cost, and having chosen the task, you are offered a choice between three different cost types. You can enter:

Let's deal with these in order. In the Machine and Operator time window you can select a machine (or 'no machine') and operator, and enter how many hours and minutes this task (or this episode of this task) took. The system should know the hourly rate for your presses, other machines and personnel, so all you have to do is enter the time taken on this task and the program can calculate the cost.

You should also note that if you enter the date and time, the system can construct a proper Shop Floor History record.

· if its for something else, simply select the stock category, then the item in that category, then enter the number of units used.

In either case the system will add to the cost the proper absorption markup which is, in effect, an allowance for that item's share of the indirect costs.

As the costs for each task are built up, you should be able to see a list at the bottom of the window for each task, similar to the following, which enables you to see how the estimated figures were arrived at and what 'actuals' have been entered.

The 'actuals' can also include costs entered in other ways, for instance through shop floor data capture or via purchase invoice entry. It is possible to delete an 'actual' that has been entered in error by pressing the Delete button. You should note that if it was entered through another program, only the costing implications will be updated - i.e. shop floor history and purchase invoices won't be affected.

Finally we should mention the main front 'build-up' screen for job costing, in which the costs are totalled side by side. Here you can see at the bottom the real and theoretical costs, and profit percentage achieved.

When you have finished entering all the costs for the job you should 'sign off' the costs in the 'actions' part of the jobs desktop header tab. This means it can then be included in profit accrual and other programs as a fully costed job. If you think about it, there is little use comparing estimated against actual costs until the actual costs are all entered! Even when it is marked as fully costed you can still go on entering costs - there is often an overlooked invoice that arrives late!