Apply Basic Invoicing and Accounting Principles

The person credited with this Unit Standard will be able to perform routine financial transactions and calculations and need to apply the processes and procedures necessary to initiate the recording of disbursements and revenues, and to understand the financial implications to the organisation of each element in the transaction.

The qualifying learner is capable of:

• Explaining items of expenditure and revenue.
• Explaining fixed and variable costs.
• Performing invoicing operations and post amounts to the appropriate accounts.
• Reconciling and identifying individual transactions with statements of accounts.
• Identifying and disbursing the items on behalf of the organisation to be recovered in the invoicing process.

Learning Outcomes:

• Explain items of expenditure and revenue.
• A definition of expenditure is provided in the context of freight forwarding and customs clearing.
• A definition of revenue is provided in the context of freight forwarding and customs clearing.
• The difference between expenditure and revenue are explained as they apply to freight forwarding.
• Explain fixed and variable costs.
• Fixed cost is defined with examples.
• Variable cost is defined with examples.
• Three examples are provided where fixed costs could happen.
• Examples are provided where variable costs could be confused as fixed costs.
• Three examples must be given.
• The consequences of a variable cost being confused as a fixed cost is explained with examples.
• Perform invoicing operations and post amounts to the appropriate accounts.
• An invoice is prepared which has items of expenditure and items revenue for a sea freight shipment for a full container load and import which has paid customs duty, duty schedule, and the ocean freight is on a collect basis.
• An invoice is prepared for an air freight export shipment which has items of expenditure and items of revenue where the master airway bill is collected, insurance must be invoiced as well as cartage collection charges.
• The expenditure items must be posted to the appropriate accounts for both the seafreight and airfreight invoices.
• A record is made up of the over-recoveries of the items of expenditure which must later be taken to profit.
• Reconcile and identify individual transactions with statements of accounts.
• Ocean freight or air freight is identified as items of the organisations invoices.
• Cartage is identified as an item of the company’s invoices and statements from the transporter taking into account all over-and-under recoveries.
• All landside and surface charges are identified including port authority charges, airline charges, depot charges and carrier’s handling.
• All customs and charges are identified and reconciled with bills of entries, statements and deferment accounts.
• Other disbursements charges are identified and reconciled with invoices from those parties taking into account all over-and-under recoveries.
• Other disbursements may include but is not limited to other agents’, storage charges, packing, fumigation, inspection, insurance.
• Supplementary charges from outside parties are identified and reconciled to the organisations invoice taking into account all over-and-under recoveries.
• Supplementary invoices are disbursed by the organisation and account for all disbursement items which have been invoiced.
• Reconciliation is made between the invoices and statement of accounts.
• Identify and disburse the items on behalf of the organisation to be recovered in the invoicing process.
• Cartage charges as disbursed by the organisation, are identified and posted to the cartage disbursement account.
• Storage charges as disbursed by the organisation are identified and posted to the storage disbursement account.
• All special charges such as extra attendance are disbursed by the organisation are identified and posted to the disbursement accounts.