WACOSS Conference May 2016 Costing and Pricing – A new software tool for the sector…

Partners  The Costing and Pricing Software project is a collaboration of the following organisations:

Today’s presentation…  The Software…  Project snapshot  National Costing & Pricing Framework  How the software can assist the sector  Software functionality  Costing and Pricing methodology  Website, resources and support  How you can be involved  Are we there yet?

Project snapshot… The Software…  …was Borne out of an identified need to provide additional resources to the community sector is the area of costing and pricing services and as a potential conduit to a general improvement in financial management  …has been designed and developed through consultation with the sector  …has been designed to mirror the NDS/Curtin Uni National Costing and Pricing Framework  …is standalone but sits within the Microsoft Excel user interface and connects to popular accounting packages e.g. MYOB, Reckon, Xero  …is scalable and flexible, organisations of all sizes could utilise the software to some degree  …is free-of-charge to WA based not-for-profits and available to other organisations for an annual subscription  …is available now for trial via the dedicated ‘Drop-in’ web platform.

National Costing & Pricing Framework

How the software can assist the sector…  Simple one-off Activity-based costing models to support funding applications  More complex Activity-based financial models incorprating income generation, output service units and unit costing  Create and retain Activity-based project Budgets (accrual and cash)  Create and retain full organisation Activity-based budgets  Use the reporting function to produce financial reports, from management accounts to full Board packs.

Software functionality Financial Modelling Budget Creation Financial Reporting -Activity based, logic driven by user -Costing (expense) and Pricing (income) -Accrual to cash conversion -Unit costing -Model can be retained as an activity budget -Can be created by activity from ‘actuals’ -Can be manually inputted -No limit on number of budget ‘versions’ -Report by activity and/or account -Traditional reports in pre-set templates -20+ templates with layout flexibility -‘Publish’ function for report packs

Costing and Pricing methodology Activity 1 Activity 2 Activity 3 Costing (Expenditure) LOGIC SETS Ascription (direct cost) Allocation (indirect cost) $/day Service Units COST MODEL

Costing and Pricing methodology Activity 1 Activity 2 Activity 3 Pricing (Income) COST MODEL Direct Income $ / period $ / item /period Funding Income $ / period $ margin / cost Service Income $ / unit $ margin / unit INCOME MODEL Apply income $/day

Costing and Pricing methodology COST MODEL INCOME MODEL Cash Conversion Rules ACCRUAL BUDGET CASH BUDGET

Costing and Pricing – Logic Sets

Costing and Pricing - Ascription

Costing and Pricing - Allocation

Costing and Pricing – Service Units

Costing and Pricing – Income Drivers Direct Income $ / period $ / item /period Funding Income $ / period $ margin / cost Service Income $ / unit $ margin / unit

Costing and Pricing – Income Drivers Direct Income $ / period $ / item /period Funding Income $ / period $ margin / cost Service Income $ / unit $ margin / unit

Web site, resources and support  The software has a dedicated web platform…   The site includes:  User group  User Guides and other relevant resources  FAQ’s  Support options

How you can be involved…  Download the software  Pass on the link to a colleague or fellow sector worker  Encourage people just to trial it (no data-file connection required)  Join the User Group  Engage with and test the software  Provide feedback via the website or phone  Attend User Group meetings and training sessions

Are we there yet? Some potential enhancements…  Improve the ‘what-if’ functionality of the software by including modelling scenarios  Improve the graphical capacity of the software to enable outputs to a broader range of stakeholders and those with less financial literacy  Move the software to the.net framework to greatly enhance the user interface and interactivity  Continue to enhance the software to respond to the full roll-out of ‘person- centred’ care and the NDIS  By building a base of users, accommodate more community sector specialist financial management requirements  Build a front-end transaction processing for very small community organisations so that they could truly have a totally self contained financial management package

WACOSS Conference May 2016 Costing and Pricing – A new software tool for the sector…