Fund Accounting

Custom Columns offer greater Reporting Flexibility

The ability to create Custom Columns is a feature introduced in version 6.0. The Custom Columns feature allows users to create their own Variance and Percent Total Remaining Columns from posted budget versions. These Custom Columns can also be used in the Financial Statements to look at various date ranges using the Date Override and be used to Forecast and manipulate the Budget using the formula feature.

Date Override

The Date Override function of the Custom Columns is a great way to see prior period financial data. It can be used to set any date range. Examples of this would be previous months, quarters, years and multiple years back.

The Date Override can be based off of Actual or Budget information. The actual information can come from a Fixed Date range or Rolling Dates.

For rolling dates you can select a relative date on which to base the custom column. This relative starting date accommodates the basic requirements of comparing current periods with prior months and years. Rolling Dates can report on a calendar month, calendar quarter, or fiscal year; beginning on the first day and ending on the last day of the period.

Forecasting

The Custom Columns feature can also be used for forecasting.

Using the Formula Editor, forecasting can be achieved through multiplying an actual or budget column.

In the following example the company expects 10% growth in the coming year based off the dates on the setup tab. The Current Year Actual column is multiplied by 1.10 to include the current year plus 10% for the forecast.

Budget Reporting

The Custom Columns feature can also be used to modify budget reports based on an organization’s current needs. Budgets can be reported as Monthly, Quarterly and Yearly entries.

For some organizations, a Yearly budget is entered but the reporting requirements change during the year requiring a monthly budget figure based off the Yearly entries. The following example demonstrates taking the Total Budget and dividing it by 12 to show the budget for one month.