Overview of Budgets in General Ledger
The Budgets function is a very robust feature in Data Plus, giving you the ability to View Budgets for a particular Fiscal Year, Copy Budgets from one year to another, Add a Budget to a year, Delete a Budget from a Year, and Create brand new Budgets—all from a single task! This information can be printed on financial statements. Budgets can be established for any General Ledger account. These budgets can then be printed on financial statements or used for analysis with the Budget Balances and Budget Analysis Monthly Reports. Forecast amounts can be entered with the budget task for use in comparing actual to forecast. Statistical (unit) budgets can also be entered.
Please contact Data Plus, if
you wish to establish or update budgets by importing budgets from an ASCII file
created from an external application (such as Microsoft Excel®).
Budget, forecasts, and statistics are all examples of budget types. A budget type is a name that identifies a group of accounts and their budget amounts. An account may have more than one budget type and a budget type may have more than one fiscal year, as shown in the following diagram:
You can use the Budget task under File Maintenance > Budgets to do the following:
1. Create new or delete an existing budget type/account.
2. Modify existing Budget Amounts
3. View all budgets for a particular Year.
4. Copy Budgets from one year to another.
Upon selecting the Budgets button from File Maintenance, the following screen will appear. Simply type in the Fiscal Year for which you wish to view budgets and press the View Year button. All of the budgets for that year will be displayed. You may select the budgets you wish to modify or delete by using your mouse, by entering a range of accounts to select, or by using the 'Select All Rows' and 'Deselect Rows' buttons.You may also use the Filter and Order options to further filter those budgets you wish to view.
Filter Information
Budget Type
To view only those budgets for a particular budget type, specify that budget type here & then press the Budget Type button to the right of the screen, under Order Option.
GL Account
To view budgets for a particular GL Account, specify the account in this field & then press the GL Account button to the right of the screen, under Order Option.
If you wish to view a particular budget type for a specific GL Account, specify your selections in the above fields, then select the Type/Account button to the right of the screen, under Order Option. This will filter out all other budgets/gl accounts, allowing you to view only that Budget Type/Account which matches your selection.
This function, found on the main Budgets Screen (shown below), allows the user to copy budgets from one year into another. This task is used to duplicate sets of budgets, usually to go from one year to the next. The amounts may be copied as well or cleared.
Upon selecting this button, the following screen will appear:
Enter the Budget Type and Fiscal Year that you wish to Copy From. Then enter the Budget Type and Fiscal Year you wish to Copy TO. If you wish to clear the existing Budget amounts that currently exist in the Copy To budget type, say YES, and the existing amounts will be overwritten. If you wish to add to the existing budget amounts, enter No. Press F2 to continue.
Add Budget to Year
This function, found on the main Budgets screen (shown below), allows you to add a Budget to the fiscal year you specified, or create a brand new budget.
Upon selecting this button, the following screen will appear:
The system will display a list of all the Budget Types/Accounts that do not exist in the year you specified on the previous screen. You may select the Budgets you wish to add a number of different ways.
1. Highlight each budget individually using your mouse.
2. Use the 'Select All Rows' button on the right hand side. It will automatically highlight all of the budgets displayed.
3. Enter in a budget type, starting and ending account range, and then select the Use Range button. The system will automatically highlight all of the budgets that fall within the range you specified.
4. To filter the budgets displayed, use the Filter Information section, in which you can enter in the budget type and GL account you wish to filter, then choose on of the order options to the right
Once you have highlighted the budgets you wish to add to the year (specified on the previous screen), press F2. The following screen will appear, with the budget type/account entry you selected:
You may enter in the budget amount information on this screen. Listed below are the field descriptions:
Budget Type
This field displays the budget type of the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Account
This field displays the Account of the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Method
This field displays the Method of Entry for the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Annual Amount
If using method ‘E’, leave this entry blank. For methods ‘M’ and ‘W’, enter the annual amount for this budget type. A change to this amount is reflected in the monthly budgets, which is automatically recalculated. For accounts with a ‘credit’ budget amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany this amount.
Fiscal Year
Enter four digits to identify the fiscal year.
SOY
Enter the start-of-year budget amount. This entry is not added to the annual amount, nor is any amount distributed to it. It is normally set to ‘0’ for income/expense accounts and to actual or projected figures for asset/liability accounts. For accounts with a ‘credit’ SOY amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany this amount.
Month Descriptor
This is the three-character month descriptor. [-Displayed-]
Monthly Amounts
If ‘E’ was entered as the method, enter the separate monthly amounts in the corresponding fields. For accounts with a credit budget amount, the numbers entered must have a negative (‘-‘) sign. The system changes the Annual Amount to reflect the sum of the month’s entries. As stated above, if the budget method is ‘M’ or ‘W’, the monthly figures are calculated by the system. A thirteenth month is provided for those installations using thirteen 4-week fiscal periods. For accounts with a ‘credit’ month budget, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany the amount.
EOY
Enter
the end-of-year amount budgeted for this account. If entered, the end-of-year
amount is added to the annual amount, but no amount is distributed to it when
budget figures are calculated by the system. For accounts with a ‘credit’ EOY
amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany this amount.
Note: In order for the budget entry to be saved, you must press F2 twice. The
following message will appear, notifying you that the budget entry has been
saved:
Create New Budget
This function, found on the Add/Create Budgets screen (shown below), allows you to create a brand new Budget, which does not currently exist in the system.
Selecting this task will bring you to the following screen, where you are able to insert the details of your new Budget:
Listed below are definitions of each field for the above screen shot.
Budget Type
A budget type identifies a group of accounts and their budget amounts. An account may have multiple budget types. Since DPHS has the ability to set up multiple years within a budget type, the budget type should NOT indicate a fiscal year.
Account
This field is the general ledger account number to which the budget applies. The description or name of the account is displayed for verification.
Description
This can be any text to describe the budget.
Method
This is a code from the list below to identify the method of budgeting to be used. This determines how budgets are calculated from the annual amount that is entered.
(M)onthly If the amount of the budget is to be divided evenly into twelve accounting periods by the system, enter ‘M’.
(W)eekly If the annual amount of the budget is to be divided into a 4/4/5 weeks per quarter format, enter ‘W’.
(E)ntered If amounts are to be manually entered for each month separately, enter ‘E’. Since this is the most common method, it is the default.
After you press F2 to continue, the next screen appears. This indicates fiscal year information.
Budget Type
This field displays the budget type of the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Account
This field displays the Account of the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Method
This field displays the Method of Entry for the budget/account you selected on the previous screen.
Annual Amount
If using method ‘E’, leave this entry blank. For methods ‘M’ and ‘W’, enter the annual amount for this budget type. A change to this amount is reflected in the monthly budgets, which is automatically recalculated. For accounts with a ‘credit’ budget amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany this amount.
Fiscal Year
Enter four digits to identify the fiscal year.
SOY
Enter the start-of-year budget amount. This entry is not added to the annual amount, nor is any amount distributed to it. It is normally set to ‘0’ for income/expense accounts and to actual or projected figures for asset/liability accounts. For accounts with a ‘credit’ SOY amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany this amount.
Month Descriptor
This is the three-character month descriptor. [-Displayed-]
Monthly Amounts
If ‘E’ was entered as the method, enter the separate monthly amounts in the corresponding fields. For accounts with a credit budget amount, the numbers entered must have a negative (‘-‘) sign. The system changes the Annual Amount to reflect the sum of the month’s entries. As stated above, if the budget method is ‘M’ or ‘W’, the monthly figures are calculated by the system. A thirteenth month is provided for those installations using thirteen 4-week fiscal periods. For accounts with a ‘credit’ month budget, the negative (‘-‘) sign must accompany the amount.
EOY
Enter the end-of-year amount budgeted
for this account. If entered, the end-of-year amount is added to the annual
amount, but no amount is distributed to it when budget figures are calculated by
the system. For accounts with a ‘credit’ EOY amount, the negative (‘-‘) sign
must accompany this amount.
Note: In order for the budget entry to be saved, you must press F2 twice. The
following message will appear, notifying you that the budget entry has been
saved:
Deleting Budgets
Budgets may be deleted from both the main Budgets screen, and also the Add/Create Budgets screen. On the main screen, you will see a button called 'Delete Selected Budgets'. This will delete any budgets that you have selected on the main screen, for the Fiscal Year you specified. Simply highlight the budget you wish to delete, then press the Delete Budget From Year button.
Upon highlighting a budget to delete and selecting this button, the following message will appear. Select ‘Yes’ to delete budget.
There is a second Delete Budget function found on the Add/Create Budgets screen (shown below). This task allows you to delete Budgets that do not exist in the year specified on the previous screen. Simply scroll to the budget you wish to delete, highlight it and then press the Delete Budget button.
Upon highlighting the budget you wish to delete and pressing the Delete Budget button, the following message will appear. Select ‘Yes’ to delete budget.
If you have any questions or comments regarding Budgets, please contact Data Plus Support at 978-888-6300 x 3 or email support@dphs.com