How a CFO Can Help with Standard Cost Accounting

As a business owner or manager, 您必须准确地预测成本，以便制定价格，使您的公司有效地运作并扭亏为盈.

In industries such as manufacturing, 标准成本会计可以让你看到你的成本预测是否正确，并根据需要及时调整. 

What Is Standard Cost Variance Analysis?

标准成本差异分析是一个过程，它揭示了您在关键预算领域(如材料和劳动力)期望支付的费用与实际支付的费用之间的差距. 您使用一个公式来确定您的预期成本-标准-然后在月末将该数字与实际数字进行比较. 理想情况下，这些数字应该很接近，但看到正方差或负方差并不罕见. 

Types of Standard Cost Variances

有几种类型的标准成本差异，包括:

• Fixed overhead spending variance
• Labor rate variance
• Purchase price variance
• Variable overhead spending variance

However, 许多小型企业合并为两种差异:采购价格和制造成本(通常包括劳动力和管理费用). 

Why Standard Cost Variance Matters 

Clearly understanding your costs can sharpen your budgeting and forecasting and improve operational efficiencies. 然而，较小的制造商可能没有追踪到足够的细节. Often, they simply flush their costs each month, 将它们合并到两个总账账户中——工资和材料成本. 他们可能会估算所使用库存的成本，但没有确切的数字. That makes effective analysis challenging.

更成熟的制造商使用标准成本会计, which allows for detailed tracking and, therefore, valuable analysis. Ultimately, standard cost variance becomes a KPI you see right on your financial statement.

How It Works

Let’s say your company manufactures a widget. 你的生产成本包括劳动力和制造部件的材料成本加上日常开销.

Purchase price variances

当您购买用于制造小部件的材料时，您预订了您期望支付的标准成本. 如果标准价格和你实际支付的价格有差异, that amount goes to the variance account. 如果你支付的比预期成本多，那就是负方差. If you paid less, that is a positive variance.

Over time, variances may fluctuate. Hopefully, they even out, but that is not usually the case. If the variance is mostly positive, 你可以相应地调整这种材料的标准尺寸. 你也可以考虑降低价格，因为制作这个小部件的成本比你想象的要低.

If you are seeing negative purchase price variance, especially if the variance is large, 你需要了解原因，这样你才能采取纠正措施. Did prices go up due to inflation? Do you need a savvier purchasing person? Should you buy in larger quantities to get a volume discount?  如果你不能轻易降低价格，你可能需要考虑提高价格.

Manufacturing cost variances

Manufacturing cost variance is far more complex, so it may make sense to break out labor from overhead. 您遵循相同的流程——生产每个小部件需要这么多的劳动和这么多的开销, so you calculate standards for each type of cost.

At the end of the month, you can analyze the variances. If it is negative in terms of labor cost, ask yourself:

• Is the standard wrong? (也许制造每件物品的时间比标准的计算时间要长. If so, a price increase would be most appropriate.)
• Are you running up unexpectedly high overtime expenses? 如果你雇佣临时工来处理一个大项目，或者因为生意兴隆，你只是需要更多的帮助来保持生产力，这种情况就可能发生. 然而，如果高额的加班费用持续存在，则需要仔细分析以找出原因。.
• Is your cost of labor off? For instance, are temps costing too much, 或者是技术工人被用来做非技术工作?
  

On the overhead side, you follow the same process, considering the multiple factors that contribute to cost, such as:

• Your factory/facility
• Machinery
• Supplies
• Shipping materials
  

Again, at month-end, 你记录下标准间接成本，然后计算任何正或负的方差. Some overhead costs, such as rent or salaries of foremen and supervisors, tend to be fixed, while others, such as supplies costs, vary. Still, 这个过程将使控制间接成本和理解差异背后的原因变得更加容易.

Almost always, 管理费用的差异是由数量引起的，因为你的成本是固定的，但制造数量是可变的. 如果您生产的小部件比预期的少，那么固定的间接成本仍然是相同的. 如果你赚的比预期的多，你可能会看到正方差.

开销差异可变的一些常见原因包括耗材浪费, shrinkage/theft of tools, and inaccurately created standards. 通常，在较小的组织中，最后一个原因是最容易发现和解决的.

遵循相同的流程来制定标准并分析每种类型成本的差异是很重要的.

The Role of a CFO

Because analyzing costs is crucial to profitability, this is an area where a CFO can be especially useful, 帮助您了解标准成本会计是如何工作的，以及如何在发生差异时“解读”差异. 这不会改变预算流程，但差异确实会影响你的预算. Budgets should be developed using standard cost, and budgeted items help develop accurate standards, especially for overhead.

Take the following steps to get started:

• 使用当前的采购和工资信息来确定标准材料和人工成本.
• 当你做预算时，你可以逆向计算实际的间接成本. 您还可以使用历史标准成本执行计算. These numbers should be close. 你应该根据这些分析来调整你的标准或预算. 这可以成为你每年常规预算过程的一部分.
• 年中或至少每年回顾标准成本，以便在需要时及时调整. Meanwhile, 每月的分析也将提供一个早期的警告，一个标准的成本，所以你可以调查的原因.
  

如果你在制造业务中看到成本差异，而你的团队中没有首席财务官, consult an experienced financial advisor or fractional CFO, who can perform the same role. 他们可以在有限的业务范围内帮助您识别和纠正当前的成本问题，并建立一个流程来准确计算标准成本，以支持有效的未来会计和盈利能力分析.