Budget Reporting Issues

[Wm...]

Fri, 28 Aug 2015 12:49:06 
<C9D78E9E-29B7-447A-98AE-44DC30B5F671 at yahoo.com>
David T. <sunfish62 at yahoo.com> wrote...

>Hi,

In the course of trying to address shortfalls in documentation around 
reports, I began poking around in the various Budget reports and 
features, and I wanted some explanation on a number of points. Bear with 
me if I ask questions that are meaningless; I do not use the Budget 
features much, and probably don’t understand the original intent of 
the various reports. Add in the fact that I Am Not An Accountant, and 
you will further understand my questions.

By all means, if you know better what a report is meant to do, and can 
clue me in, it will help me write up accurate descriptions of the 
reports.

This exercise was done a few years ago. But I agree some of the 
Budgeting remains opaque and needs another visit.

Before we get going which bit of Documentation are you looking at 
changing? The Tutorial & Concepts, Help, both, something else?

Generally, what is each report meant to do? The grouping includes:

I'm sure many cultures have a similar tales but one is: "when asking an 
old man directions to point B he may suggest you return to point A"

I suggest understanding the reports without understanding how the 
Budgets themselves work will be time ill spent.


Budget Balance Sheet
Budget Barchart
Budget Flow
Budget Income Statement
Budget Profit & Loss
Budget Report


Fortunately in order to understand the Budgets you can get by with one 
report: Budget Report (the one at the bottom of the list).


I understand (somewhat) what these reports mean in a common sense, but 
what exactly are they meant to do in the context of a Budget? For 
example, a Balance Sheet provides a summary of all your accounts as of a 
certain date. But what does a Budget Balance Sheet report? The numbers I 
get match neither the budget numbers *nor* the actual numbers.

Ah, you see, it depends on how you have set your Budget up

More generally, I believe that the data presented in the reports is 
derived from the budget, with the exception of of the Budget Report, 
which includes both Budget and Actual amounts. Is this right?

The Budget Report is key to understanding.

I have similar questions regarding the other reports in this grouping.

Which Budget?
Each of the reports under the Budget grouping automatically loads with a 
particular budget as its base. If a data file has more than one budget, 
however, it appears that the report automatically opens using the first 
listed budget. Wouldn’t it be more appropriate for these reports to 
open using the last accessed budget? Furthermore, there does not appear 
to be any way to sort the list of budgets; they are always stored newest 
to oldest. So whatever budget you created last, that’s the default 
budget for every report.

File / Properties / Budgeting tab controls the default budget.  More 
generally if you get a Budget report to do what you want or close to it, 
hit "Save Report Configuration As"

Which Information?
It would seem to me that any report that is based on a budget should 
only display accounts for which budget information has been provided. In 
my tests of a few of the budget reports, however, I have found that the 
various reports include different account sets. The Budget Balance Sheet 
and Budget Flow includes all accounts (and the Omit Zero Balance option 
on the Balance Sheet does not always work). The Budget Barchart includes 
some subset of accounts that I simply can’t fathom, I just know that 
it isn’t the budget. The Budget Income Statement and Budget Profit & 
Loss Statement are the same report; both include all accounts by 
default. Budget Report includes all accounts, and there is no way to 
show only accounts from the budget.

Before I start trying to write documentation for these reports, I’d 
like some input from folks who have used (or written) these reports to 
be sure I get an accurate description.

OK, a month or so has passed and no-one else is playing.

I'm going to repeat something I said above for emphasis.  None of the 
Budget Reports will make sense until the reader understands gnc Budgets, 
to understand the reporting (very much after the event) only one report 
is actually needed, the Budget Report.

I practice I give other people saved reports and tell them what to 
change as it is a bugger to explain.  There is a lot of capability but#

   make budget <-- make sure that is what you want using
   Budget Report
   time passes
   *then* and *only* then
   start doing reports other than the Budget report
   chances are you won't actually need the others

I know you asked about the reports but you'll be doing the community a 
service if you skipped the reports and described the budget function in 
a way more people can understand.  I'm prepared to help as there is a 
lot of useful stuff there but I'm not the best bottom up explainer.

Ask Q's and I'll answer may be one way to approach this.  If I have gaps 
then it is a smaller set for others to fill.

I do think this is worth doing, BTW.

-- 
Wm...