OFFICE ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT 593 



loaf of bread or a gallon of ice cream purchased at wholesale. These diffi- 

 culties are not insurmountable and should not deter any park department 

 from keeping such records. Cases have been found where the leakage has 

 been as great as twenty per cent of the gross sales, and before such a system 

 as that outlined above was installed, an average of ten per cent was not 

 infrequent. The installation of a check-up system should reduce such 

 leakage to one per cent or less. 



A monthly check-up on seasonal activities is not frequent enough if 

 the season lasts only two or three months. In such cases, a weekly check-up 

 should be made and where the operation of taking the inventory is simple, 

 a daily check-up is not impractical. 



Manager's daily reports. The manager of each revenue-producing station 

 should be required to make out a daily report of the business transactions 

 of the day. This report should show the amount of cash on hand at the 

 beginning of the day, the day's sales classified into the various methods of 

 taking in the cash which are at his disposal, such as cash registers and 

 their readings, rolled tickets and their readings. These reports should be 

 checked, extensions verified and results posted daily at the central office. 

 Figures 7 and 8 are examples of such reports. 



Cash audits. Quite frequently during the business season the cash at 

 the various revenue-producing stations should be counted and compared 

 with the daily reports so that it is a known fact that the cash which is 

 reported actually exists at the station. These audits should be made by 

 someone from the auditing department at times when the manager of the 

 revenue-producing station is least expecting such an audit. Frequently an 

 audit will disclose matters of poor financial management such as the indis- 

 criminate loaning of money and other practices not conducive to good 

 financial management. 



Other records on business activities. Certain revenue-producing activities 

 require and justify other detailed studies, such as comparison of sales with 

 weather reports and with financial conditions; studies of past performances 

 in order to project these experiences into the future and anticipate future 

 business possibilities; in fact, all studies which might be applied to any of 

 the usual retail businesses can likewise be applied to the retail business 

 carried on by a park department. 



5. Special fund accounting construction records. As has been pre- 

 viously stated, special funds are created for special purposes and usually 

 for the purpose either of acquiring new park areas or for carrying out some 

 park improvement project. The expenditures from these funds are not in 

 the nature of annual expenditures but rather of project expenditures and 

 hence no annual budget is feasible. In its place there should be required 



