Conducting an electronic meeting among several parties at remote sites is teleconferencing. It can be accomplished by telephone or electronic mail group communication software. Videoconferencing permits the conferees to see each other on video screens. The practice has grown in recent years as companies have attempted to cut their travel costs.

Depreciation should be consistent with the accounting policy for owned assets. Absent a reasonable certainty that the lessee will own the asset at the end of the lease term, it should be fully depreciated over the shorter of the useful life or the lease term. The lease does not transfer ownership or contain a bargain purchase option. Accordingly, the period of amortization should be the lease term. In accordance with the straight-line method used by KW for owned assets, the depreciable base for this finance lease is equal to the US $240,000 initially recorded minus the US $50,000 guaranteed residual value allocated equally over the 4-year lease term. Consequently, annual depreciation expense is US $47,500 [($24,00,000 - $50,000) - 4 years]. On January 1 Plantation Partners is planning to enter as the lessee into the two lease agreements described in the opposite column. Each lease is noncancelable, and Plantation does not receive title to either leased property during or at the end of the lease term. All payments required under these agreements are due on January 1 each year.

Materials requirements planning (MRP) is a system that translates a production schedule into requirements for each component needed to meet the schedule. It is usually implemented in the form of a computer-based information system designed to plan and control raw materials used in production. It assumes that forecast demand is reasonably accurate and that suppliers can deliver based upon this accurate schedule. MRP is a centralized push-through system; output based on forecasted demand is pushed through to the next department or to inventory.