When running the equipment profit and loss report from calculation report, there are a few columns on that report which can be matched back to your General Ledger accounts 510 and 511. (Or A510 and A511)
- The total direct cost column minus the total depreciation can be matched back to the 510 or A510 account
- The total indirect cost column should be matched back to the 511 or A511 account
The direct cost column adds up all of the direct costs for individual pieces of equipment when the equipment questionnaire calculation is ran.
The indirect cost column is calculated using the indirect percentage that is entered when the equipment questionnaire calculation is ran. This percentage needs to be manually calculated from the equipment profit and loss direct costs column and the total indirect costs in the 511 or A511 accounts. The following steps will describe how to correctly calculate that percentage:
- Run the Fixed Asset Calculation program to generate all of the depreciation transactions for your fixed assets. This needs to be done before working with the equipment questionnaire calculation.
- Run the Fringe Benefits Spread program to spread the fringe benefits across all of the appropriate accounts. This also needs to be done before working with the equipment questionnaire calculation.
- Make sure the Fringe Benefits Spread and the Fixed Asset Calculation programs have been ran.
- Run the Equipment Questionnaire Calculation program and enter a 0 for the indirect percentage.
- After the Equipment Questionnaire Calculation is finished, then run the Equipment Profit and Loss from Calculation report. If you include the benefits percentage in the calculation then you don’t need to enter a Benefits Percent on the report parameters tab. Otherwise, enter the Benefits Percent value that you calculated for the Benefits and Overhead percentage.
- Make a note of the amount in the Total Direct Costs column found on the last page of the report. If the last page is just the report parameters that you entered, then move one page further back until you see the Total Direct Costs amount.
- Then take that Total Direct Costs number and divide it by the total indirect costs in your 511 or A511 account. This will result in a percentage which is usually around 70 – 90%.
- Now run the Equipment Questionnaire Calculation program again but this time when it asks for the indirect percentage, enter the percentage that you calculated in step 7.
- Then rerun the Equipment Profit and Loss From Calculation report with the same parameters as in step 5.
- Check the amount shown for the Total Indirect Costs column and it should match up with the value in your 511 or A511 account.
This should help you to correctly calculate the indirect cost percentage used by the Equipment Questionnaire Calculation program to generate the indirect costs for your equipment.