Case study analysis on Accounting Information System for Andrew West

Question

Task: Assessment Task 2: Case Study

Student Instructions
Andrew West started SurfZone in Bondi with the goal of providing good quality surfing equipment to his customers. To ensure year round business, Andrew sells both Surfing and Snow Ski products and he also has a lucrative snow ski hire department that is strongly patronized by school groups and families. Business has been brisk and he has established a sizeable client base over the last five years. Andrew thinks that it could be the time to spend in Computers to record details about the sales, payroll process and offer more details about the inventory. Andrew thinks with the implementation of the Computer in each store would help the store in capturing of the sales information & managing of the hiring details, capturing the details of the customer would help the store manager in forming a targeted marketing campaign in the future, the computer would help the store to capture the details about the stock sold so that exact stock levels could be known, the Computer offers the way to calculate the wages & to electronically pay staff and the implementation of the Computer provides useful & relevant data for sales forecasting. Lastly, some recommendations have been given in order to improve the resolve the problems for the accounting & payroll problems (Collier, P & Venables, 2007).

Description of the Problem
Andrew believes that it will be possible to modernize some of the business process for reducing the amount of time, which it is taking for data processing. Andrew believes that it can be time to spend in Computers to record more details about payroll process, sales and the details about the inventory. It has been analysed that the Andrew wants to open up six further stores throughout the next three years & any systems used should be capable of supporting these developments (Bigsten, 2004)

It has been analysed that no details are captured about the customer only provide details about the purchased goods, the method of payment, member of the staff, purchased quantity, price & totals.

It has been analysed that levels of stock are recorded by using the stock card. It can be seen that the details of the new inventory are entered into the cards when the new stock and details of sold units are changed at the termination of each trading day. It is very clear that when things become hectic, marketing off stock sheets can be forgotten and hence they are not very exact. To know the level of the stock item, the physical check is needed. It has been observed that the stock take is conducted at random times when Andrew thinks it may be better to know what is in each of the stores. It has been analysed that when the user return the hired items, the member of the staff retrieves the duplicate from the file comprising both the details of the docket & the information of the credit card. This can be viewed as the process of time consuming as sometimes dockets are misfiled & users become worried for the delay. It is very clear that no of complaints have been made by the user on the number of occasions. At the end of each & every week, the spreadsheet was sent to Andrew who used it for forecasting of sales & also offers the information to various accountants for completing the statements of the Business Activity.

Solution Objective
The objective of the solution is to provide assistance to Andrew in solving of various issues like maintenance of customer details, maintenance of marketing off stock sheets, collection of useful data for sales forecasting and accurate calculation of wages & to electronically pay staff. It has been analyzed that the implementation of the Computer in each of the three stores helps in capturing of sales information, customer details, maintenance of marketing off stock sheets, collection of the data for sales forecasting and helps in calculation of the wages for employees. It is very clear that in recent times, Computers help the Company in operations & controlling function (Greenwood & Jovanovic, 1990). Computer helps the Company in maintaining of operations like calculation of wages, maintenance of ledger and invoicing etc. Another important feature of the Computer helps in analysis of the sales, credit control & budgetary control. The Solution is provided to the Andrew to implement those changes in existing three stores and open further six stores in the next three years with those changes & developments. For e.g. In this case each of the three stores, captures sales at the point of purchase by the cash register machine. There are two machines in each store operated by the sales counter. The implementation of the Computer in each store helps in capturing of sales information without the cash register machine which would help the Ski Zone & Andrew in minimizing of the cost.

Constraints
It has been analyzed that there is a computer for the assistant and Andrew has a laptop computer that he uses to prepare details for the accountant to complete the Business Activity Statement. He also carries out some analysis on spreadsheets for sales forecasting. It can be seen that the accountant of the each store was maintaining details about the sales, purchase and inventory manually not on the Computer. The Andrew had decided to implement the Computer in each store which became difficult for accountants to make reports on Computer as they were in the habit of making reports manually. It can be said that change in technology may also be the factor which made the accountant & employee of the Company resistant to change. In general, it is very clear when the company goes for any kind of changes then employees show reluctance to change (Cooley & Smith, 1998)

Developmental Plans
The first & foremost development plan is implementation of the Computer in each of the three stores.

For Capturing of the sales information It can be seen that analysis of the forecasting indulges the usage of the Computer Software. It has been analyzed that the software of sales forecasting would have a format of dashboard in which statistics & charts are clearly visible on the single page.

For Maintenance of sheets of marketing off stock The system may be designed which it activate orders when level of stock arrives point of order for distinct items of the material and test items that are moving slow and provides record of various stock items.

For Computation of wages It is very clear that in recent time, Computers help in operations of the Company like computation of wages, ledger maintenance and invoicing etc. With the implementation of the Computer in each of the three stores it enables the accountant of the store to calculate accurate wages by using excel feature and spreadsheets

Required:

Write a report to evaluate the proposed information system and provide your recommendations (Word Limit: 1000 words).

 * Learners and assessor should refer to the assessment evidence checklist & record as below:

Answer:

1.0 Introduction
Andrew West started a Surfzone with a goal to provide of better quality of surfing equipments to the customers. The existing system of the store is such that it does not record customer’s details, hiring details along with sales and inventory information. Therefore, the employees are not able to track their customers and other purchasing details (Khodakarami and Chan 2014). Andrew thought that implementation of information system into each of three stores capture sales data, manage the hiring details, capture customer’s details about payroll, sales and inventory. The design of new information system is used by Andrew for sales forecasting, offering of information to different accountants in order to complete the statement of business activities.

2.0 Proposed information system
Due to implementation of computer into each of the three stores, the store manager can able to solve various issues Customer based relation software would enable the store for storing relevant information about the existing or new customer (Symons 2014). The proposed information system for the store is “Sales Management CRM System”, which would enable the store manager to capture details of customers regarding purchased goods, quantity, payment method, price and total purchased orders (Laudon and Laudon 2016). It is analyzed that implementation of computer would enable to use of CRM software and help in maintaining customer’s details. The proposed information system processes the information throughout computer for managing and supporting the managerial decisions into the store. Andrew thought that implementation of “Sales Management CRM System” into each of the three stores would help in maintenance of sheets for marketing off stock which leads a good reputation on the suppliers. The information system should assist the inventory control, maintain the sales date, purchase records and find optimum level of recorder for various items (Peltonen 2015). The proposed information system captures the sales information, maintenance of marketing sheet and computation of wages. It is analyzed that the proposed information system would help three stores into sales report generation such as financial statements, status of inventory and reports on performance.

With implementation of proposed information system into three stores, it would enable the accountant to store and calculate the wages by use of excel as well as spreadsheets. It would enable the accountant for examining of data a single sheet along with assisting of managerial decisions (Agnihotri et al. 2017). The proposed system helps in operations such as wages computation, maintenance of ledger along with invoicing. The system also helps into the hiring process and providing salary to the employees. The system would enable the store manager to pay electronically to the employees with help of electronic fund transfer. The assistant manager is also helpful by use of this system by calculating of accurate as well as fair wages for the employees. It is being analyzed that relevant changes into existing system would help Andrew to open six stores in next three years (Johnston and Marshall 2016). The system would also help in find out the default debtors along with determine the exact time of credit for debtor in addition to put of stores ledger. Therefore, the main advantage of the proposed system is to maintain of accounting records.

The proposed information system should create reports on the company’s past as well as current financial related activities. The proposed information system should show the profit, loss along with financial records of the customers which help the management team to track the sales records of the customers and their details in future (Arroyo et al. 2017). The company can control the cost using the “Sales Management CRM System”. This proposed system would help the company in order to track the resources to make the business operations organized. The manager can print the financial reports that show the daily activities of company such as how the products and services are used and how it is used to make the future decisions (Kumar 2015). It is also observed that the proposed system automates the entire sales process and results into increase into revenue and decrease of waiting time.

3.0 Conclusion
It is concluded that computer is used for carrying out the administrative work into three of the stores. The proposed information system helps in billing, inventory control and accounting details. It also utilized for hiring process and salary and wages purpose. The proposed information system is being implemented into the accounts areas for carrying out financial transactions. Computation of the salaries and wages are related to details of employees such as job rate, tax liabilities and gross pay which are stored into the information system. Therefore, the system helps each of the stores for improvement the organizational performance along with store’s efficiency.

4.0 Recommendations
Following are the recommendations which are suggested to Andrew:

Review the outcome of proposed system: The store manager should review the outcome of proposed information system which helps in maintaining of accounts details. They should enter appeal for sums in relation to incentives, salary, benefits for different employees. The organization should reconcile accounts of payroll included of expense accounts, register for payroll from the service provider of payroll. The proposed system should provide of accounting payroll in cost effective way.

Follow rules and regulations: The store should follow of rules as well as regulations regarding the payroll, accounting. It would also help to minimize the issues related to payroll as well as accounting.

Decision taking: The information which the store manager receives from “Sales Management CRM system” has related to decisions the manager has made. Proposed information system has taken the data which is originated in areas of management activity which concern the manager at provided time.

Performance of proposed system: It should also analyze that effectiveness of proposed information system consists of accuracy along with reliability of the information. Historical performance is input of proposed information system, as well as serves a measure of accuracy along with reliability of the output. The output of proposed information system should be current and the management team should make decisions about future of company based on data from present.

References
Agnihotri, R., Trainor, K.J., Itani, O.S. and Rodriguez, M., 2017. Examining the role of sales-based CRM technology and social media use on post-sale service behaviors in India. Journal of Business Research, 81, pp.144-154.

Arroyo, J.A., Kruger, S.P., Silva, L. and O’sullivan, P.J., International Business Machines Corporation, 2017. Integrating metadata from applications used for social networking into a customer relationship management (CRM) system. U.S. Patent 9,626,727.

Johnston, M.W. and Marshall, G.W., 2016. Sales force management: Leadership, innovation, technology. Routledge.

Khodakarami, F. and Chan, Y.E., 2014. Exploring the role of customer relationship management (CRM) systems in customer knowledge creation. Information & Management, 51(1), pp.27-42.

Kumar, V., 2015. Customer relationship management (CRM) in services companies. International Research journal of Management Sociology & Humanities, 6, pp.521-525.

Laudon, K.C. and Laudon, J.P., 2016. Management information system. Pearson Education India.

Peltonen, H., 2015. CRM system implementation supporting the management of customer relationships.

Symons, M.J., Single Funnel Pty Ltd, 2014. Customer relationship management (crm) systems. U.S. Patent Application 14/192,692.