Welcome to Accountonomics. This game will be putting you in charge of a simulated company. Your decisions will drive the results against other players in a competitive market.  The game is divided into multiple rounds, and each round represents a single operating year for your business. Once the market closes for the year, you will be given a round report showing all of the business decisions. You will use the round report to create journal entries, T-accounts and ultimately, your financial statements. Good luck and we hope you enjoy Accountonomcis! 

OVERVIEW - RUNNING YOUR COMPANY 

Phase 1: Make Your Elections

You will have three tabs to navigate:

Get Cash: Here you will elect from various sources of financing including issuing stock, taking out loans, selling bonds, or selling long-lived assets.

Spend Cash: On this tab you will purchase long-term assets such as land, buildings, and store furnishings.

Go to Market: Here you will elect which products you would like to offer for sale.

Pro Tip: While working through the three tabs, keep an eye on the dashboard at the top of your screen as you make elections to see the changes.

Long-term assets

• Land

  • Your Land can hold only a limited number of Buildings.

  • Land cannot be depreciated.

• Buildings

  • Each Building can only hold a limited number Store Furnishings.

• Store Furnishings

  • Each piece of Store Furnishing has limited Shelf Capacity

  • The total number of goods that you can sell in the market will be limited by your total Shelf Capacity 

• All newly acquired land, buildings, and equipment are PLACED IN SERVICE at the start of the round (i.e. at the beginning of the year).

Make A Bid – Go To Market Section 

• Look at each product’s demand curve (hover over the chart to see the demand curve numbers at the price), try to think what the other teams are going to do, and then make your bids. 

• After all bids are submitted and the timer hits zero,  the game will determine which teams have sold products.  

• If, at the end of the round, your team does not sell all the goods that it expected to sell, your team will have an INVENTORY of unsold goods that it can sell in the market in future rounds. 

Phase 2: Compile Your Financial Statements

Once the game has moved from the Bid Stage to the Financials Stage, you will be able to see the Round Report. You will use this report to find out all of the transactions you had in the year. These transactions will need to be entered into the double entry accounting system using journal entries. Once you have all your journal entries you can start to build your T-Accounts and Trial balance, Once you have your Trial Balance, you can build out your company's Financials! 

Prepare and submit your company’s Financials by navigating to the desired tab. If you are supposed to enter data in a field, it will have an  “EDIT” button. Click edit and fill in the information in the proper fields.

Phase 3: Score Board and Next Round

After your financial statements are submitted and the timer goes to the next round you will be able to see a scoreboard and a grade. You can review the scoreboard to see how profitable your team was compared to other teams, and see how each team competed for sales of the available products.

ADVANCED TOPICS:

Common Stock

Your company begins the game by issuing common stock shares as detailed on the “Get Cash” page. Your stock price will fluctuate at the end of each round based on numerous factors including your total assets, net income, and performance compared to your peers for that round.

In subsequent rounds you can raise cash by selling additional shares of stock. These stock shares will be priced at the closing stock price from the previous round.

Selling INVENTORY 

Starting in Round 2, your company, in addition to selling its newly purchased goods, can sell its INVENTORY of goods accumulated from prior rounds.  When selling INVENTORY, your company is treated as selling its inventoried units before it sells its newly purchased units.  This is an application of the FIRST IN, FIRST OUT (FIFO) method of INVENTORY accounting. The Round Report will indicate which products you sold came from previous inventory and which came from newly purchased units.

Income Taxes 

Starting in Round 3, the income tax rate is applied to your company’s PRE-TAX NET INCOME for the round to determine the company’s income taxes.  Income taxes are paid in cash and are an EXPENSE that will reduce your company’s AFTER-TAX NET INCOME.  If your company generates a NET LOSS for a round, your company will not owe any income taxes for that round. Check the Round Report to see what your company’s income tax rate is.

Loans 

Starting in Round 4, your company can now raise money by borrowing from the bank. Check the dashboard at the top of your screen to see the maximum amount of debt you can take out each round, and the total outstanding debt you can have at any one time.  Loan principal amount must be paid in full within the loan term; however, your company can make full or partial repayments of a loan in any round. If your company elects to pay off all or a portion of a loan with cash during a round, that payment will occur at the start of the round. The annual interest rate on the debt shown in the Loan tile on the Get Cash page, and in the round report for outstanding loans. Interest must be paid in cash each year, and loans are assumed to be initiated at the start of the round (or first day of the year).

Junk Loans - If your company spends more cash than it generates during a round, your company will be issued a “junk loan”. The annual interest rate on a junk loan is higher than a typical bank loan, and the junk loan must be repaid within 3 years. You can see outstanding Junk Loans and the applicable interest rate in your round report. Your company borrows the cash associated with its junk loan at the end of the round and that loan will not begin to incur an INTEREST EXPENSE until the beginning of the next round. 

Accounts Receivable

Starting in Round 4, your company will begin selling products to customers on short-term credit. At this point, all sales are assumed to be made on credit, and your round report will indicate the percentage of credit sales that are collected in cash during the current year. Any amount not collected will remain in AR and is assumed to be collected within one year.

Bad Debt: In some rounds, it will be determined that a percentage of AR from previous rounds will not be collectible. Your Round Report will indicate a percentage of beginning AR (AR from previous rounds) that was determined to be uncollectible. This amount will need to be written off, and all other AR from the previous round is assumed to have been collected in cash.