is very difficult (and not always recommended) to develop a pure ABC model because
the particular characteristics of a single third-party logistics company entailed the use of
slightly different ways to allocate several costs in some instances, which a purely ABC
approach would not be able to do. Despite this fact, the final model for both sides of the
third-party company operations (warehouse and transport operations) has been mainly
described by taking ABC analysis into account. Only when ABC does not present an answer
to a specific problem should another way be considered to allocate the costs.
It is recommended that such a model should be developed by using a spreadsheet
because it fulfills the needs of the company, it is a very powerful tool, and it is also very
user-friendly. Furthermore, the model developed may be capable of performing what-if
analysis in order to simulate actual or potential situations the third-party company might
face. These what-if analyses may be used in different ways such as in the analysis of
potential consignors, in the requirement of different service levels by the current consignors,
and to perform the analysis of structural changes in the third-party logistics company.
Finally, note that the costs of the model should not exceed its benefits. In other words,
it is necessary to cope with the trade-off between a model that is so simple that it fails to
provide enough information to support the company's decisions and a model that is
excessively costly to design, implement, and operate [Brimson, 1991]. This should always
be taken into account, trying to achieve a happy medium between simplicity and excessive
sophistication.