Developing enabling cost information during the COVID-19 crisis

In this paper, we build upon the crisis literature and theorisation of enabling design principles to examine how cost information was calculated and used in response to the COVID-19 crisis in public hospitals in New South Wales (NSW) Australia. This study analyses how various actors sought to respond to demands for cost information that was immediate, intense, and dynamic as the pandemic unfolded. In response, we observed two costing processes emerging. One focussed on the immediate pandemic funding requirements whilst the second addressed future activity-based funding requirements. The crisis created a situation in which matters present in business-as-usual costing practice became more visible. The four enabling design principles help us to theorise the complex interactions between how cost information might be constructed differently to relate to different purposes relating to both internal and global transparency.