Cornerstones of Managerial Accounting 4th Edition by Maryanne Mowen, Don Hansen, Dan Heitger

Exercise 38

Activity-Based Product Costing
Suppose that a surgical ward has gathered the following information for four nursing activities and two types of patients:
Required:
1. Determine the total nursing costs assigned to each patient category.
2. Output is measured in patient days. Assuming that the normal patient category uses 10,000 patient days and the intensive patient category uses 8,000 patient days, calculate the nursing cost per patient day for each type of patient.
3. Conceptual Connection: The supervisor of the surgical ward has suggested that patient days is the only driver needed to assign nursing costs to each type of patient. Calculate the charge per patient day using this approach and then explain to the supervisor why this would be a bad decision.