Most firms using process costing maintain continuous high-volume production, and unless the just-in - time philosophy is applied, a considerable amount of partially processed inventory typically is on hand in each department at the end of each accounting period. A partially processed unit obviously should not assigned a full amount of cost; therefore, some adjustment of the basic unit cost is needed. The calculations necessary to account for partially completed inventory represent one of the fundamental characteristics of the process cost method. These calculations are discussed in Chapter 6.