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HA2042 – Accounting Information Systems
This assignment has 4 parts with 350 words every part & preference, total is 1500 words!
PLEASE DON’T DO IT TOO PERFECT, USE NORMAL WORDS, CUZ IM TEST RESULTS ARE NOT TOO HIGH MARKS, IF DO IT TOO PERFECT, THE TEACHER WILL NOT BELIEVE THAT I DO IT.
MANY THANKS!
Group Assignment – T2 2015
You are to prepare a submission to satisfy your client’s requirements as outlined
below. You are required to investigate the issues at Pressure Hydraulics and provide
a feasibility study into the improvement to their current business processes. You will
need to conduct an investigation into the client’s problems and evaluate a solution to
meet their business needs.
Overview – Pressure Hydraulics
Pressure Hydraulics is a locally owned business that currently has three service
centres; Newcastle, Toronto and Maitland. Each service centre provides
maintenance and specialised servicing of hydraulic systems as used in cars, trucks
and earth moving equipment. The Maitland service centre also provides a specialty
service to the mining industry where two purpose built trucks go onsite to service a
range of mining equipment.
The business has become quite profitable in the past years and its owner, Allan
Taylor, has devised plans to expand by opening service centres at Coffs Harbour
and Gosford. Allan has future plans for other service centres along the east coast of
NSW. He also feels that the time is right to look at how IT can support the existing
business and enable his future business plans.
Currently, Allan spends a portion of each day at each service centre to monitor its
operations. This is leaving little time to continue developing his business and he
realises he will not be able to spend the same sort of time in the Coffs Harbour and
Gosford service centres.
Existing System
Each service centre operates as an independent business, with eight technicians in
the workshop (one of whom is a workshop foreman) and one office assistant. The
office assistant takes phone calls from people requesting quotes for work or to have
work done. For requests on quotes, the office assistant looks up a hard copy of a
price book (known as The Price Book) and gives a verbal quote. Allan is unhappy
with the time being taken to update the Price Book as the office assistant is often too
busy to update the prices from the supplier invoices. Sometimes, this time delay
results in either lost sales if the price has gone down or lost income if the price has
gone up.
If a customer phones to make a booking for work to be done, the office staff
assistant writes down the details in a journal (Works Book). Any variations to the
Works Book by a customer requesting to change a date/time results in crossed out
entries. There have been times when this has been the cause of misinterpretation as
to when a job is booked in. Other problems with the system include occasional
overbooking or slack periods for the workshop staff.
When a customer arrives at a service centre for work to be done, the office staff
member writes out a Job Card with the customer details along with the price from
The Price Book for the job. There is sometimes a discrepancy between what the
Price Book shows and what the customer says they were quoted for that particular
work. When completed, the Job Card is passed to the workshop foreman who
assigns the job to a technician. When the job is completed, the technician initials the
Job Card and gives it back to the workshop foreman, who returns it to the office. The
office assistant writes out an invoice and collects payment from the customer; cash,
EFTPOS and credit card are acceptable forms of payment. Once per week, the
office assistant uses the Job Cards to prepare an order for stock replacement.
Allan has developed a business relationship with several transport companies where
two technicians will go to the transport companies’ central site and service the
hydraulics on a truck. As the parts required to perform the service can be varied, a
special van equipped with basic workshop equipment and a full range of component
parts is used. The time taken for these jobs can be varied and unpredictable. Upon
returning from such a job, the technicians will alert the workshop foreman that the job
has been completed. The office assistant is then informed and an invoice written out
and mailed to the transport company. Carbon copies are used to track such invoices.
The Maitland service centre provides a service to the mining industry and there have
been a few repeated issues with the incorrect component parts being taken onsite
for servicing the machinery. Such mistakes not only costs a loss in terms of travel
time back to the service centre to collect the correct part, but the mining companies
have very tight maintenance schedules. Machinery has to be available and delays
are not tolerated.
Each fortnight, Allan contacts the workshop foremen and checks the hours worked
by staff at the service centre. He then prepares the payroll and writes cheques for
each employee.
Each day, the office assistant banks the day’s takings and gives the bank receipt to
Allan when he makes his daily call. Usually this will be the following day from the
bank deposit. Allan then does a reconciliation of money banked with the previous
day’s takings.
Apart from the issues identified above, Allan wants to achieve the following:
- Ensuring repeat business from mining companies.
- Improve control over stock ordering. A new system is required to manage this
aspect of the business. The ability to order stock for the three businesses instead of
individual ordering would ensure economies not being realised at the moment.
- Ability to quickly determine if a required component part is in stock.
- Ability to generate an invoice off data held within the system.
- Improved payroll process to reduce the need to contact staff for details. Allan would
prefer a system that recorded the working hours daily and also supported staff being
paid directly through his bank system.
- Tracking customers for repeat business. Allan wants a system that will track
customers and contact them at specified times with special offers.
- Price Book issues. A system to have timely production of price variations to arrive
at all service centres on the same day.
- Technology to support these changes.
After an initial investigation, Allan has asked your group to develop a feasibility report
on providing a suitable solution for the accounting and payroll problems. At a
minimum level, your feasibility report should contain the following generic sections:
Your Task:
You are required to submit a feasibility report.
At a minimum level, your feasibility report should contain the following generic
sections:
? Executive Summary
? Description of the problem
? Solution objectives
? Constraints
Your appendix should also contain (extra marks)
? Any brochures (scans), websites, photographs and prices you have
researched to complete your assignment.
? Diagrams and/or business processes for the development plans and potential
solutions.
Feasibility Report Marking Guidelines
Executive Summary ………………..../2
Description of the problem …………./3
Solution objectives ………………..…/3
Constraints …………………………..../2