Overview:

This screen is accessed via the ellipses button next to the Job that you want to create or modify budgets for, then selecting "Budget." 

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Budgets in Workbench are an essential part of controlling your job costing throughout your business. Budgets are used not only for productive jobs, but administrative jobs as well to track spending against a target. Budgets are an internal spending measurement and should match your company's methodology for tracking jobs rather than your client expectations; budgets and their corresponding reports are generally only for internal use.

Budgets are divided into types, and you can have as many budget containers as your project needs. For straightforward projects, one Original Contract budget container can be used to hold the entire budget, whereas staged projects can be divided into one container per stage to keep things organised. Variations are traditionally created in a unique container for each variation number, with the Internal Reference usually representing the sequence number and the Description defining what the variation relates to. You can also send budgeted costs directly to new Purchase Orders and Work Orders through the budget screen, as well as budgeted revenue to an existing Contract Schedule.

When using the Contract module for a project (when there are progress claims involved), the Contract Budget tab is the preferred screen to manage budgets. Also, a convenient budget summary is provided on the Contract Summary tab.

Screen Guide:

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• + New Job Budget will open the new budget screen; see the Create/Edit Budget page for more information.

• + New Journal will also open a new budget screen, with the key difference that a Journal must be balanced, i.e., the totals must equal 0 or a net gain/loss of nothing. Journals are used to make adjustments to originally budgeted amounts without changing the original budget itself, increasing transparency and traceability in the movement of budgets. A use case example would be that we originally budgeted for $10,000 of a specific material, but this was in error; we would create a Journal with the first line negating the $10,000 using negative numbers in the same Work Breakdown structure as the original line, then a positive $10,000 to the correct Job/Work Centre/Activity combination. The total would equal $0 and is therefore balanced, allowing you to save the Journal.

• Filters are available to narrow down the budgets you wish to see.

• Budget Type can be any one of the standard budget types:

  • Original Contract - for all budgets that were part of the original contract that was signed.

  • Approved Variations - for all variations that have been approved. The type can be changed later once the approval occurs.

  • Increased Costs - a budget type only for situations that have a cost element but no revenue. The system will not allow revenue to be entered for this budget type.

  • Other Costs - a generic type that your company can use in whatever manner it deems appropriate.

  • Recharges - a type that is used in situations where an existing budget has been recharged from your company to another by the client. These are meant to be negative budget variations or scope reductions.

  • Contract Contingency - this can be used to hold contingency amounts held for future variations or overruns.

  • Unapproved Variations (in Forecast) - Variations that are to be requested but not yet approved can be entered using this type. In Forecast means that when the forecast is generated, it will include this budget in the calculation. It is therefore recommended that only variations that are likely to move forward are entered using this type.

  • Risk (in Forecast) - this type can be used in a variety of ways, one being a place to put a positive expectation of cost that has not yet been realised (no orders, invoices, or timesheets have been created yet for the expectation). In Forecast means that when the forecast is generated, it will include this budget in the calculation.

  • Unapproved Variations (not in Forecast) - Variations that are to be requested but not yet approved can be entered using this type. Not In Forecast means that when the forecast is generated, it will exclude this budget in the calculation. It is therefore recommended that only variations that are less likely to move forward are entered using this type.

  • Risk (not in Forecast) - this type can be used in a variety of ways, one being a place to put a positive expectation of cost that has not yet been realised (no orders, invoices, or timesheets have been created yet for the expectation). Not In Forecast means that when the forecast is generated, it will exclude this budget in the calculation.

• Budget Header is the Hierarchy Level 1 Job, or the top-level job if there are subjobs present. Budget containers can have lines for multiple Jobs in the hierarchy.

• Internal Reference is a required free text field that keeps your budgets organised, and serves as a link to the Create/Edit Budget screen. This can be whatever your company needs it to be to match internal expectations. It is recommended that variations are labelled with the sequence number of the variation that the budget represents (V001, V002, etc.).

• Client Reference is an optional field that can be used to label the budget something that your external stakeholders refer to it as. The typical use case of this field is when your client refers to your variations as something other than what your company traditionally labels them.

• Description is custom text meant to define what the budget container represents. This is important for variations to make sure your team knows what the variation signifies.

• Year/Period is the financial year and period in which this budget was created. Note that this field will affect which forecast/cash flow periods this budget is recognised in; forecasting a year/period previous to the budget year/period will not recognise the budget.

• Budget Date is the date that was entered as the creation date for this budget. This date determines what Year/Period it is in.

• Cost Rate is the total of all cost rates in the underlying budget lines.

• Cost is the total cost amount of all underlying lines that this budget contains.

• LC Retail Rate stands for the total Local Currency retail rates of the underlying budget lines.

• LC Revenue is the total Local Currency revenue amount of all underlying lines that this budget contains.

• Approved Date is the date that this budget was approved if your company uses budget approval.

Next Steps:

To create a budget, simply click on the + New Budget button, or to edit an existing one, click on the Internal Reference field of the budget. Both will take you to the Create/Edit Budget screen.