Archive for Oktober 2014
There are several applications that make use of batch processing, the most common ones being payroll, billing (electricity, gas, water and telephone) and cheque processing.
I. Payroll
The 'payroll' of a business is the system used to calculate the salary(how much they are paid for their work) of each employee.
Employee wages are usually calculated and paid either every week or every month.
Payroll systems are quite complex with lots of calculations to take into account. Many
variables are part of the process including the following:
- Gross pay (pay before any deductions like tax)
- Net pay (pay after deductions)
- Rate of pay (how much the employee is paid per hour)
- Number of hours worked
- Tax codes (used to work out how much tax the employee should pay)
- Pension (deducted from employee pay)
- Overtime (extra money paid for working more hours than contracted)
- Bonuses (extra money paid for excellent performance)
- etc....
After employee pay has been calculated, the system will print the information onto what
is known as a 'payslip'. The payslip fully breaks down the wage to show all rates,
bonuses, deductions etc.
2 copies of the payslip are printed one for the employee and one for the company
Inputs:
- Bank details (so wages can be paid into employee's bank account)
- Rate of pay (needed to calculate gross pay)
- Number of hours worked
- Overtime worked (usually paid at a higher hourly rate)
- Tax code (needed to calculate tax dedcutions)
Processing:
- Gross pay (hours worked mutiplied by hourly rate of pay, overtime etc)
- Caculation of deductions (tax owed, insurance owed, pension contributions)
- Net pay (gross pay minus deductions)
Outputs:
- Printed pay slips
- Wages paid into employee's bank account
Effects of payroll systems on companies:
Accuracy:
If the payroll system has been programmed with accurate calculations, employees will be paid the correct wages.
Humans manually calculating wages with calculators can often make mistakes and employees could be paid too much / too little.
Quicker :
Manually calculating employee pay with calculators is a time consuming process.
A computerised payroll system does most of the work for you and is much faster.
Increased productivity :
With the payroll system doing most of the work, company managers are freed up to concentrate on other tasks.
II. Billing Systems
Billing systems are used by businesses to send out bills/invoices to customers.
Examples of companies that send bills to customers include water, gas, electricity and
phone bills.
These companies produce huge amounts of bills.
These bills/invoices can be sent out to customers in the following ways:
- As a printed bill in the post
- Online through the company website (customers get email alerts when a new bill arrives)
Customers would pay the bill in one of two ways:
- Send a cheque through the post
- Pay online using a credit card or a bank debit card.
Billing systems are usually automated. This means that bills are calculated automatically without much human input.
Inputs:
- Customer details (name, address etc)
- Electricity usage reading (read from electricity meter in customer's home)
- Charge per unit of power used
- Bank / Credit Card details (if customer pays their bill online)
Processing:
- Calculate electricty usage (new usage reading minus old usage reading)
- Calculate electricity costs (electricty usage multiplied by charge per unit)
Outputs:
- Printed bill showing customer details and total amounts owed (if customer does not pay online)
- Online bill showing total amounts owed (if customer pays online)
- Email requesting online payment (if customer pays online)
Effects of billing systems on companies:
Increased productivity
Computerised billing systems are automated. This means that human employees do not need to spend a lot of time manually creating and calculating bills. Human employees will then have more time to handle other
tasks.
Lower employee costs
Because the automated computer system does most of the work in terms of billing, less employees are required. This saves in wages etc.
Reduced paper wastage
Many companies now use electronic online billing. This means that there are less paperbased bills being produced which is good for the environment.
III. Automatic Stock Control System
Stock control systems keep track of the items that a business manufactures or sells.
Businesses do not want levels of stock to be too high or too low.
For Example:
Too much stock costs the business money for storage (warehouses etc)
Too little stock means that the business may run out of products to sell
A stock control system can help monitor stock levels and automatically reorder
products whenever their numbers fall too low.
A stock control system is really just a database that stores details of the products sold
by the business.
The database stores details of the products. For example:
- Item code (a unique code which identifies each type of stock individually)
- Description of stock items (brown bread, large eggs, coca cola etc)
- Price of item
- Item stock level
- Minimum stock level (lowest amount of the item before we need to order more)
- Number of stock to reorder (how many items should be reordered from supplier)
When items are delivered to the business they are scanned into the system. This is how it works: Items come with a barcode. Barcodes contain all of the information about the
product:
- Item code
- Description of item
- Price of item
- etc....
The item's barcode is scanned with an input device called a barcode reader.
The barcode reader inputs the product's information into the stock database.
Each time the same type of product is scanned by the barcode reader, the stock level of
that item is increased by 1.
When products are sold their barcodes are scanned again at the checkout. Information
from the barcode is sent to the stock control database which then updates it's records.
This is how it works:
Barcodes
Barcodes are made up of alternating dark and light lines of varying thickness. A number underneath the barcode usually consists of four parts: country code, manufacturer’s code, product code and a check digit. The check digit is a form of validation which is used to make sure no errors occurred during the reading of the barcode.
The check digit can be calculated in a number of ways. The method discussed here works for codes which contain 11 digits.
Consider the following code:
Every time the barcode is read, this calculation is performed to ensure that it has
been scanned correctly. Barcodes are used in the following applications:
G library book systems administration systems (e.g. in hospitals) G passport and ID card systems G some burglar alarm systems G equipment checking systems (safety records on maintenance of equipment) G automatic stock control systems (described in this section).
After employee pay has been calculated, the system will print the information onto what
is known as a 'payslip'. The payslip fully breaks down the wage to show all rates,
bonuses, deductions etc.
2 copies of the payslip are printed one for the employee and one for the company
- Bank details (so wages can be paid into employee's bank account)
- Rate of pay (needed to calculate gross pay)
- Number of hours worked
- Overtime worked (usually paid at a higher hourly rate)
- Tax code (needed to calculate tax dedcutions)
Processing:
- Gross pay (hours worked mutiplied by hourly rate of pay, overtime etc)
- Caculation of deductions (tax owed, insurance owed, pension contributions)
- Net pay (gross pay minus deductions)
Outputs:
- Printed pay slips
- Wages paid into employee's bank account
Effects of payroll systems on companies:
Increased productivity :
With the payroll system doing most of the work, company managers are freed up to concentrate on other tasks.
Billing systems are used by businesses to send out bills/invoices to customers.
Examples of companies that send bills to customers include water, gas, electricity and
phone bills.
These companies produce huge amounts of bills.
These bills/invoices can be sent out to customers in the following ways:
- As a printed bill in the post
- Online through the company website (customers get email alerts when a new bill arrives)
Customers would pay the bill in one of two ways:
- Send a cheque through the post
- Pay online using a credit card or a bank debit card.
Billing systems are usually automated. This means that bills are calculated automatically without much human input.
Inputs:
- Customer details (name, address etc)
- Electricity usage reading (read from electricity meter in customer's home)
- Charge per unit of power used
- Bank / Credit Card details (if customer pays their bill online)
Processing:
- Calculate electricty usage (new usage reading minus old usage reading)
- Calculate electricity costs (electricty usage multiplied by charge per unit)
Outputs:
- Printed bill showing customer details and total amounts owed (if customer does not pay online)
- Online bill showing total amounts owed (if customer pays online)
- Email requesting online payment (if customer pays online)
Effects of billing systems on companies:
Increased productivity
Computerised billing systems are automated. This means that human employees do not need to spend a lot of time manually creating and calculating bills. Human employees will then have more time to handle other
tasks.
Lower employee costs
Because the automated computer system does most of the work in terms of billing, less employees are required. This saves in wages etc.
Reduced paper wastage
Many companies now use electronic online billing. This means that there are less paperbased bills being produced which is good for the environment.
III. Automatic Stock Control System
Stock control systems keep track of the items that a business manufactures or sells.
Businesses do not want levels of stock to be too high or too low.
For Example:
Too much stock costs the business money for storage (warehouses etc)
Too little stock means that the business may run out of products to sell
A stock control system can help monitor stock levels and automatically reorder
products whenever their numbers fall too low.
A stock control system is really just a database that stores details of the products sold
by the business.
The database stores details of the products. For example:
- Item code (a unique code which identifies each type of stock individually)
- Description of stock items (brown bread, large eggs, coca cola etc)
- Price of item
- Item stock level
- Minimum stock level (lowest amount of the item before we need to order more)
- Number of stock to reorder (how many items should be reordered from supplier)
When items are delivered to the business they are scanned into the system. This is how it works: Items come with a barcode. Barcodes contain all of the information about the
product:
- Item code
- Description of item
- Price of item
- etc....
The item's barcode is scanned with an input device called a barcode reader.
The barcode reader inputs the product's information into the stock database.
Each time the same type of product is scanned by the barcode reader, the stock level of
that item is increased by 1.
When products are sold their barcodes are scanned again at the checkout. Information
from the barcode is sent to the stock control database which then updates it's records.
This is how it works:
Barcodes
Barcodes are made up of alternating dark and light lines of varying thickness. A number underneath the barcode usually consists of four parts: country code, manufacturer’s code, product code and a check digit. The check digit is a form of validation which is used to make sure no errors occurred during the reading of the barcode.
The check digit can be calculated in a number of ways. The method discussed here works for codes which contain 11 digits.
Consider the following code:
Every time the barcode is read, this calculation is performed to ensure that it has
been scanned correctly. Barcodes are used in the following applications:
G library book systems administration systems (e.g. in hospitals) G passport and ID card systems G some burglar alarm systems G equipment checking systems (safety records on maintenance of equipment) G automatic stock control systems (described in this section).
