Question

Jackson County Senior Services is a nonprofit organization devoted to providing essential services to seniors who live in their own homes within the Jackson County area. Three services are provided for seniors—home nursing, Meals On Wheels, and housekeeping. Data on revenue and expenses for the past year follow:

		Total		Home Nursing		Meals On Wheels		House- keeping
Revenues	$	931,000	$	266,000	$	407,000	$	258,000
Variable expenses		464,000		116,000		194,000		154,000
Contribution margin		467,000		150,000		213,000		104,000
Fixed expenses:
Depreciation		69,600		8,300		40,600		20,700
Liability insurance		43,100		20,800		7,200		15,100
Program administrators’ salaries		114,300		40,900		38,300		35,100
General administrative overhead*		186,200		53,200		81,400		51,600
Total fixed expenses		413,200		123,200		167,500		122,500
Net operating income (loss)	$	53,800	$	26,800	$	45,500	$	(18,500)

*Allocated on the basis of program revenues.

The head administrator of Jackson County Senior Services, Judith Miyama, considers last year’s net operating income of $53,800 to be unsatisfactory; therefore, she is considering the possibility of discontinuing the housekeeping program.

The depreciation in housekeeping is for a small van that is used to carry the housekeepers and their equipment from job to job. If the program were discontinued, the van would be donated to a charitable organization. None of the general administrative overhead would be avoided if the housekeeping program were dropped, but the liability insurance and the salary of the program administrator would be avoided.

Required:

1-a. What is the financial advantage (disadvantage) of discontinuing the Housekeeping program?

1-b. Should the Housekeeping program be discontinued?

2-a. Prepare a properly formatted segmented income statement.

2-b. Would a segmented income statement format be more useful to management in assessing the long-run financial viability of the various services?

Answer 1