What is Cost unit

While the cost centres assists in ascertaining costs by location, person, equipment, operation or process, cost unit is a unit of product, service or a combination of them in relation to which costs are ascertained or expressed.

A cost unit is defined as by the CIMA, London as a "unit of product or service in relation to which the costs are ascertained". The selection of suitable cost unit depends upon several factors such as, nature of business, process of information, requirements of costing system, etc but are usually relates to the natural unit of the product or service. For example, in steel, the cost unit is Tonne while in transportation services the unit may be passenger Kilometre or Tonne Km. Etc. it may be noted that while the former is a single cost unit, the latter is a composite unit a combination of the tow units.