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After reading and analyzing the case study, the students would be able to understand the critical role of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS)-compliant accounting principles in facilitating strategic alliances between publicly traded international corporations and emerging companies in informal business environments, design the company’s accounting system to ensure the application of the accounting standards contained in IFRS and understand the accounting process for properly recording a company’s transactions.

This case study deals with Giulia’s decision to take on the proposal of a conglomerate to acquire a 45% stake in her travel agency, Know Cuba First Travel Agency (KCF). Giulia was an Italian entrepreneur based in Havana, Cuba. She has dealt with informal business practices in the Cuban tourism industry. However, Foreign Investments Ltd., a publicly listed company, needs formal accounting if investing in the venture. If Giulia agrees with the proposal, an accounting information system would have to be implemented to comply with the investor’s requirements.

This case study is suitable for financial accounting undergraduate courses.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 1: Accounting and finance.

– It is related to managerial accounting including style of management, evaluation method, risk management, responsibility accounting and reporting.

– It is suitable for both Bachelor's degree and Master's degree students to apply their comprehensive knowledge of managerial accounting on the case with relevance for the courses including managerial accounting, cost accounting, cost analysis and managerial accounting seminars.

– Information given by the case informs about the decentralized management structure and style of a data communication company, Data Communication Company Limited. The delegation of authorization is used as the main control of the company to monitor the performance of each department. The case study describes the company's specific methods as well as the monitoring procedures and the reports. In addition, it also addresses the management's concerns regarding risks as it relates to the current market situation.

– To study managerial accounting courses by using this case, it certainly enhances effectiveness and efficiency of accounting curriculum. This case specifically provides a realistic perspective, comprehensive information and solution capability relevant to real world challenges, which can be applied to managerial accounting.

– Teaching note.

Tom Gould, an entrepreneur, had been operating Treadwell’s Ice Cream, a small ice cream restaurant since 2000. Treadwell’s Ice Cream had been preparing its financial statements under cash basis. Tom Gould turned over all his receipts, both personal and business expenses, to his bookkeeper who entered them into QuickBooks. At tax time, his tax accountant excluded non-qualifying expenses from the tax filing. Periodically, Tom met with his bookkeeper to determine the results of operations and financial position at the end of that period of time. Most of Treadwell’s transactions were easily recognized by Tom, who preferred to pay all expenses by cash rather than credit. However, the bookkeeper had not been separating operating from non-operating activities, and had been using multiple accounts to record the same or similar costs. Therefore, the current income statement and balance sheet were not appropriately categorized and organized. In addition, since the bookkeeper was not a tax account, business expenses had been mixed with Tom Gould’s personal expenses on the income statement. There were no adjustment to the income statement after the tax accountant identified non-qualifying expenses when preparing tax filing. As Tom and his wife were considering turning over more day to day operations to his son and hiring a non-family member as a manager to help his son, he would need the books to provide an accurate picture of the business.

Primary source materials included interviews with the owner, Thomas Gould, his son, Michael Gould, and their Accountant, Tom Mallas. Secondary source materials included monthly and annual financial data from QuickBooks (monthly data are available upon request but are not relevant to the case discussion). Other secondary source materials included geographic, economic, industry, and competitors’ information.

This case is well suited for an introductory level undergraduate financial accounting course, after accrual accounting and accounting information systems (accounting cycles) have been introduced. When analyzing this case, students will apply concepts and principles of financial statement preparation. The case is also appropriate to serve as a review of accrual accounting, and of income statement and balance sheet preparation at the beginning of an intermediate level financial accounting course. Students can be asked to reformat the income statement from the single-step format to the multiple-step format. By working through financial statements with common errors found in small businesses, students can practice identifying these errors, thus providing a review of the various sections of the income statement and prepare students for more in-depth discussions of each section. In a tax course, this case can stimulate discussions on non-qualifying expenses and common shortcomings in small business accounting.

This case focusses on internal controls necessary to prevent theft of cash collections. Troy Wheeler, assistant dean of the School of Business and Public Policy was asked to write a memorandum to the university’s internal auditor verifying that controls on the cash register in the school were adequate to prevent major theft. Troy wrote the memo, but the request awakened nagging concerns regarding the cash register. The more Troy thought about it, the more concerned he became about the potential for loss. Troy needed to identify the major weaknesses in the existing system and make feasible recommendations to improve control.

This case is based on the author’s personal association with the organization, observation, interviews of key figures in the case, and examination of relevant documents.

This case is appropriate for any graduate or undergraduate accounting class where internal controls are analyzed and documented. The case could be used in courses on internal or external auditing or accounting information systems.

Siemens Medical Solutions (SMS) offered innovative products and systems, clinical solutions, and services for medical professionals. Its latest project, transforming a hospital to digital records and processes, was experiencing serious delays that had damaged the relationship with the client. Management believed the underlying problem was that SMS was not using the correct approach to organization and processes for solutions marketing. The executives in charge of on-time completion and successful delivery of the project must now agree on a different recommendation.

Students will examine the infrastructure, customer offerings, and competitive landscape for Seimens Medical Solutions, as well as evaluate three potential organizational models (transient solutions, solutions streamlined enterprise, and adaptive solutions) to determine which represents the ideal structure for SMS. They will be able to identify the role of leadership in the organization, recommend how SMS should prepare for this change, and recommend how it would measure the transformation's success.

This case raises the question: How does a company reasonably estimate and record entries for uncollectible trade receivables, and under what circumstances are receivables written off as uncollectible? The required accounting transactions for the case involve estimating a receivables allowance both as a percentage of sales and as a percentage of accounts receivable and making specific account judgments under the direct write?off method. The subjective issues involve analyzing and assessing a company's methods of collection and accounting for bad debts.

The case study will help to learn about the importance of pre-sanction precautionary measures before lending to self-help groups (SHGs), to learn about the potential lapses and errors while sanctioning SHG finance and to learn about the importance of bank’s guidelines and compliance before sanctioning loans.

This case study details the tenure of Seema in a rural branch of Safe Bank of India located in Haryana which she joined as a manager in the year 2016. She overachieved the target given by the district collector office, and going by the tide, she kept her reliance on the references provided by non-government organization (NGO) without complying the bank’s instructions. She committed errors while sanctioning the loans, which led towards the upsurge of non-performing assets of the branch. Later on, after investigation it was discovered that she did not follow fundamental bank’s instructions. In wake of those lapses and errors, how she could have avoided those lapses and secure the public money? What were the most important documents while granting agriculture finance and what due diligence she should have taken? How did she treat calls from the government departments? Was she right in trusting the suggestions of the NGO?

This case study caters to students of various streams, namely, management, business administration and law, and can be targeted at both undergraduate and postgraduate students. It could be suitable for several types of courses and students. Furthermore, this case study can also be targeted for various training programmes for bank employees and employees of various lending institutions engaged in agriculture finance and credit linkage programmes.

Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 1: Accounting and finance.

The purpose of this paper is to study and identify the four core management principles of the POLC management framework: planning, organizing, leading and controlling. In particular, students are expected to understand that the classical conceptual frameworks used in strategic management are useful and valid for the planning principle in tech startups.

This case study presents the story of Tomás Pollak, founder and CEO of Prey, a software company dedicated to tracking stolen mobile devices. It covers a period of six years beginning at the foundation of the company in 2009 and up to 2015, when the company faced the choice of entering into an alliance with a government agency: The Investigations Police of Chile (PDI or Policía de Investigaciones de Chile). Tomás faced the decision of either going through with the alliance, while dealing with the dire need of recruiting and retaining company talent. This case highlights several management challenges and common strategies faced by entrepreneurs and is intended to spark a class discussion about how the relevance of these management concepts in the context of startups.

Undergraduate, MBA or Post-Graduate courses: Entrepreneurship, Venture Creation, Tech Ventures / Startups / Scaleups, Management / Corporate Management / Business Administration, Strategy.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 3: Entrepreneurship.

The Director, Jaipuria Institute of Management, Lucknow is preparing to face two challenges: maintaining the educational purpose of transforming students into down-to-earth managers and lifelong champions of the institute, and attracting and retaining good faculty. The case illustrates the institutional processes that a school which is part of a chain needs to consider. The tension between autonomy and conformity, and the concept of a corporate office, which is new to educational settings, are illustrated.

Using this case, the students will be able to: understand the ethical issues such as “Management by Trust”, and having specific “Code of Conducts” in an organization; analyse the unethical behaviour that can occur inside the organization based on ethical theories such as egoism, utilitarian, deontology and virtue theory; discuss elements that promote fraudulent behaviour using the fraud triangle framework; explain how internal control contributes in deterring fraudulent employee behaviour; and analyse strategic approach to handle employee misconduct to reduce the risk of fraud.

The owner of Fortune Weddings, Anis, realized that his business was not as profitable as it used to be in the early years. He was suspicious of his employee Samera, for the sudden change of her luxurious lifestyle, but he did not inquire her as she was a hard working employee and customers were fond of her friendly attitude. Nissa, the wife of Anis, received message from customer to confirm the payment, but when she checked the bank account, the money was not there. Further investigation by Nissa revealed that it was Samera who was stealing money from the company. She used to give her personal bank account to customers to transfer their payment. Anis must decide the appropriate course of action to resolve the issues as soon as possible. Failing to do so will incur more incidences of stealing.

The intended audience for this case study are both undergraduate (BBA) and postgraduate students (MBA, MSc) who are taking the Business Ethics course.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 7: Management science.