Question { TATA, 17518 }

What is meant by Cost Accounting? How it is different from
Financial Accounting?

Answer

FINANCIAL ACCOUNTING

Financial accounting is concerned with preparation of
financial statements for decision makers, such as
stockholders, suppliers, banks, government agencies,
owners, and other stakeholders.

Financial accounting is one branch of accounting and
historically has involved processes by which financial
information about a business is recorded, classified,
summarised, interpreted, and communicated; for public
companies, this information is generally publicly-
accessible. By contrast management accounting information
is used within an organisation and is usually confidential
and accessible only to a small group, mostly decision-
makers. Tax Accounting is the accounting needed to comply
with jurisdictional tax regulations
It is used for the external users such as the investors,
shareholders etc.

Financial accouts shows the profit and loss and balance
sheet made during an accounting period, and also financial
position of the business as on a particular date.


COST ACCOUNTING

Cost accounting on the other hand is the process of
tracking, recording and analyzing costs associated with the
products or activities of an organization. Usually used in
manufacturing, service and companies where the focus is in
costs...

Costs are measured in units of nominal currency by
convention. Cost accounting can be viewed as translating
the Supply Chain (the series of events in the production
process that, in concert, result in a product) into
financial values.

It is used for the internal use for the estimation of the
cost of a product or project.
Cost is the amount of the expenditure. In cost accounting
we can find cost of goods and services. cost accouting
provides the management detailed information regarding cost
of each product, services etc.