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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
BUS4012
Introduction to Business Finance
Time Constrained Assessment
Date for Submission: Please refer to the timetable on iLearn
(The submission portal on ilearn will close at 12:00 UK time
on the date of submission)
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Assignment Brief
As part of the formal assessment for the programme you are required to submit a
Business Finance Time Constrained Assessment (TCA). Please refer to your Student
Handbook for full details of the programme assessment scheme and general
information on preparing and submitting assignments.
Learning Outcomes:
After completing the module, you should be able to:
On successful completion of this module students will be able to:
1. Explain different sources of business finance available to organisations
2. Apply basic management accounting techniques including budgeting, investment
appraisal and cost volume profit analysis
3. Interpret financial accounting information, perform and evaluate basic accounting
transactions and perform basic financial ratio analyses
4. Identify and assess the role of various FinTech applications.
Professional Skills: Perform effectively within the professional environment. Work
within a team, demonstrating interpersonal skills such as effective listening,
negotiating, persuading and presentation. Be flexible and adaptable to changes within
the professional environment
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Guidance
Your assignment should include: a title page containing your student number, the
module name, the submission deadline and the exact word count of your submitted
document; the appendices if relevant; and a reference list in AU Harvard system(s).
You should address all the elements of the assignment task listed below. Please note
that tutors will use the assessment criteria set out below in assessing your work.
You must not include your name in your submission because Arden University
operates anonymous marking, which means that markers should not be aware of the
identity of the student. However, please do not forget to include your STU number.
Maximum word count: it is expected that your submission should not exceed 3,000
words
Please refer to the full word count policy which can be found in the Student Policies section
here: Arden University | Regulatory Framework
Please note the following:
Students are required to indicate the exact word count on the title page of the
assessment.
The word count includes everything in the main body of the assessment (including in
text citations and references). The word count excludes numerical data in tables,
figures, diagrams, footnotes, reference list and appendices. ALL other printed
words ARE included in the word count.
Please note that exceeding the word count by over 10% will result in a 10-percentage point
deduction.
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Arden University © reserves all rights of copyright and all other intellectual property rights in the learning materials and this publication. No part of any of the learning
materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Assignment Instructions
Instructions:
This assessment should take you no longer than 4 hours and can be completed
at any point during the 24-hour window. Please ensure you give yourself
adequate time to upload your completed paper to Turnitin.
For further guidance on the TCA assessment please click on this link:
https://vimeo.com/398870288/2283356462
No formulae sheet is provided, you are expected to access these from appropriate
library sources (if required).
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Questions
All questions are compulsory and relate to the following case study.
AAA Ltd.
AAA is a large, privately owned supermarket retail group based in the UK. It has a
total of 30 stores throughout the UK. The business is family owned and was founded
by Gene Cooper who has recently stepped down as chairperson. From 20X3, the
business has been run by one of Gene’s children, Lindsay.
The company has always been debt averse but there is evidence that the business is
being held back by a lack of capital investment, especially in the key areas of online
sales and store layouts. As a result, Lindsay is considering borrowing £200m to fund
the cost of developing an online sales division (AAA has no online sales activity at
present). The finance director also wants to invest in a new double entry bookkeeping
system as the current one has led to misstatements and errors in the financial
statements. Lindsay is not convinced this is an important or beneficial investment,
however.
AAA are notorious for centralising services and functions, and the company has the
highest operating gearing ratio in the sector. Lindsay wants to continue with this policy
and has plans to centralise more retail store functions which will require relocating
staff to the head office. Many of these relocated staff will be required to work on the
new online sales project.
As part of the year X4 audit, AAA’s auditors noticed that the organisation’s incremental
budgeting system required managers to provide very little justification for their budget
requests. They also identified significant budgetary slack in AAA.
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
The following accounting and financial information is available:
Statement of Financial Position: 20X3 and 20X4

Note total trade creditors are 40 for 20X4 and 42 for 20X3
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Profit and Loss 20X3 and 20X4

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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Question 1
Required:
a) Calculate appropriate financial ratios covering AAA’s

(20 marks)
b) Comment upon the results of your ratio analysis and AAA’s operating gearing ratio.
(10 marks)
c) Identify some of the key advantages for AAA should they choose to invest in an effective,
automated bookkeeping system.
(10 marks)
(Total: 40 marks)
[LOs: 3,4]
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Question 2
As part of the planned expansion into online sales, AAA is considering investment in
several items of IT hard and software. One such item is a centralised route planning
piece of software (for the delivery vans). Lindsay believes this will lead to increased
profitability. There are two possible choices of software that could be selected; the
investment information and estimated cashflows for each software package is shown
below:

AAA has a cost of capital of 14%.
Each piece of software has a useful life of 4 years. The scrap value will be zero for
both.
Required:
a) Calculate the accounting rate of return (average method) for each software
package.
(6 marks)
b) Calculate the payback for each software package.
(6 marks)
c) Calculate the net present value for each software package.
(6 marks)
d) Advise AAA as to which software package should be chosen.
(8 marks)
e) Explain how the use of FinTech could be beneficially incorporated into the online
retail sales project.
(14 marks)
(Total 40 marks)
[LOs: 2, 4, 5]
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Question 3
Required:
Draft a briefing note to the chairperson Lindsay, which:
a) Discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the different approaches to budgeting
that could be used by AAA
(10 marks)
b) Identifies and explains the problems that can be caused by organisational slack
(budgetary slack).
(5 marks)
c) Identifies and briefly discusses some of the main sources of debt finance that AAA could
select to fund the new online retail sales project.
(5 marks)
(Total: 20 marks)
[LOs: 1, 2, 5]
End of Questions
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materials or this publication may be reproduced, shared (including in private social media groups), stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means,
including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about
the use and distribution of programme materials please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Referencing Guidelines
You MUST underpin your analysis and evaluation of the key issues with appropriate
and wide ranging academic research and ensure this is referenced using the Arden
University (AU) Harvard System.
Follow this link to find the referencing guides for your subject: Arden Library
Submission Guidance
Assignments submitted late will not be accepted and will be marked as a 0%
fail.
Your assessment can be submitted as a single Word (MS Word) or PDF file, or, as
multiple files.
If you chose to submit multiple files, you must name each document as the question/part
you are answering along with your student number ie Q1 Section A STUXXXX. If you
wish to overwrite your submission or one of your submissions, you must ensure
that your new submission is named exactly the same as the previous in order for
the system to overwrite it.
You must ensure that the submitted assignment is all your own work and that all sources
used are correctly attributed. Penalties apply to assignments which show evidence of
academic unfair practice. (See the Student Handbook which is available on the A-Z key
information on iLearn.)
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in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means, including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about the use and distribution of programme materials
please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.
Assessment Criteria (Learning objectives covered – all)

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in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or means, including without limitation electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of Arden University. To find out more about the use and distribution of programme materials
please see the Arden Student Terms and Conditions.