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ACCA Applied Knowledge · Management Accounting · Sources of data

A retail company's till system records each individual sale, including item code, time and price. The finance manager produces a weekly report showing sales value by product category with percentage changes against the previous week. Which statement correctly describes the till records and the weekly report?

The till records are data and the weekly report is information. Data are raw, unprocessed facts such as individual transactions, while information is data that has been processed, summarised and compared so that it has meaning and is useful to a manager making decisions.

  1. ABoth the till records and the weekly report are data
  2. BThe till records are data and the weekly report is informationCorrect
  3. CThe till records are information and the weekly report is data
  4. DBoth the till records and the weekly report are information

Explanation

Raw facts and figures that have not been processed are data. The till records are unprocessed transactions. Once they are summarised and compared so they have meaning for decision-making, the weekly report becomes information. Option D wrongly treats unprocessed records as information.

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