You can use General Ledger Maintain Budgets to access posting accounts and enter or change the budget balance for one or any number of accounting periods. Entering GL Budgets is an optional task.
📌Note: Period names are set up and can be changed from Setups, General Ledger, Options, General Ledger Options.
Before you begin entering GL Budgets
There are a few important things to understand before entering budgets.
During an End of Year process, you select whether to reset account budgets or not. If they are reset, all budgets for the new year will need to be entered. If they are not reset, only enter those budgets that differ for the new year.
You must enter running, or to-date, budgets for variances to be reported correctly on Balance Sheet (Retain) accounts. Balance Sheet budgets are compared against running balances, so budgets must be entered as to-date figures.
⚠️Important: The budget amount you enter for each period is the amount you expect the period balance to be. Period balances show a period figure for accounts with an End of Year Indicator of 0 - Reset (usually Profit & Loss accounts) and a to-date balance for accounts with an End of Year Indicator of 1 - Retain (usually Balance Sheet accounts).
Entering General Ledger budgets
You enter your GL budgets from Setups, General Ledger, Budgets, General Ledger Budgets. Follow the steps below for each budget entry method.
Budget entry methods
Eight budget entry methods are available to save time, as the calculating is done for you. The current or changed budget details display on the right of the screen.
Selecting a budget method
From the Budget Method task area:
Using the mouse: click the button for the selection you require.
Using the keyboard: use the Up and Down arrow keys to move to the button for the selection you require. You can move to a different section using the Tab or Enter key. Shift+Tab will take you back to the previous section.
Budget Method | Description |
Annual | This method allows you to enter the total budget for the financial year. This amount is then automatically divided equally between all periods. |
Escalate | This method allows you to enter the budget amount for the first period, then select to increase each following period by either an amount or a percentage. |
Equal | This method allows you to enter the budget amount for a period. This amount is then repeated for all periods. Use this method where the budget for each period is identical. |
Index | This method allows you to enter the total budget amount for the financial year, then specify the percentage of that amount to apply for each period. The total of all your index percentages would usually be 100%, however, you can have any percentage total. |
Interpolate | This method allows you to enter the budget amount for the first period and the last period. Attaché calculates and inserts progressive amounts for all other periods, from the first period amount up to the last period amount. |
Percentage | This method allows you to enter last year's total budget amount, then specify a percentage by which you wish to increase or decrease it. The last year amount entered will be increased or decreased by the percentage, then divided equally between the periods. |
Period | This method allows you to enter or change an amount for any or all periods. Use this method when the budgets for each period cannot be calculated using any other method, or when you simply want to change a budget for a particular period. Use the Up and Down arrow keys to move to the period you wish to change. |
Range | This method allows you to specify a range of periods to which a budget amount is to be applied. Use this method where several consecutive periods — but not all periods — have the same budget amount. |
Field definitions
The following fields are available in the Maintain Budgets work area.
Field or group name | Description |
Account Code | Enter an account code or accept the account code displayed. An error message will be displayed if the account code entered does not exist or is not a posting account. Once a budget is accepted for an account, the next account in alphabetical order will display. |
Description | Once the account code is selected, the account code description is displayed automatically. |
Annual Amount | Enter the total budget amount for your financial year. This amount will automatically divide equally between the periods. |
Period Amount | Enter the period budget amount. This amount will be allocated to each period. |
Percentage/Amount | Choose to escalate each period by either a percentage (P) or an amount (A). |
First Period Amount | Enter the budget amount for the first period. Attaché will use this amount to escalate from. |
Escalate Amount | Enter either an amount or a percentage by which each period is to escalate, depending on your selection in the Percentage/Amount field. |
Total | Enter the total budget amount for the financial year. |
First Amount | Enter the budget amount for the first period. Attaché will use this amount to start and insert progressive amounts for each period, from this amount up to the last amount entered. |
Last Amount | Enter the budget amount for the last period. Attaché will use this amount to end and insert progressive amounts for each period, from the first amount up to this amount. |
Last Year Amount | Enter the total amount of last year's budget. |
Percentage Increase | Enter the percentage by which you wish last year's budget amount to increase. Last year's budget will be increased by this percentage, then divided evenly between the periods. Enter a negative percentage to decrease last year's budget by a percentage. |
Amount | Enter the budget amount to be applied to the periods within the range. |
First Period No. | Enter the first period number to which you want the amount to apply. |
Last Period No. | Enter the last period number to which you want the amount to apply. |
Memo tab | Use the Memo tab to add additional details about the budget. Unlike Notes (F4) — which only provides for date-dependent, single-line entry and is limited to displaying a maximum of ten lines at a time — Memos allow you to enter lines of any length and use the scroll bar and keyboard controls to navigate. |
🤓Tip: You can use Keystroke File Import to populate GL Budgets. See: Create and Import General Ledger budgets using Keystroke File Import
Viewing and reporting on budgets
Once budgets have been entered, you can view and report on them in the following ways:
Use General Ledger, Masterfiles, Accounts, Enquire to view the variance between the budget and actual balances for each period for each account.
Use these reports to report on your budget figures:
General Ledger, Reports, Details, Budget List.
General Ledger, Reports, Financial, Budget Variance.