How to determine total amount over budget

Question

Hi,

I started using the Budgets feature under the planning tab this year.  We had some unplanned expenses resulting in a few categories being over budget.  The summary at the top of budget page displays our total budget, total spending, and remaining spending.  I have not been able to find a way to determine how much over budget we will be if we do not adjust our planned spending in any of our under budget categories.

I realize that I can manually add up the overbudget amounts.  I am hoping the tool has a way to do this automatically.

Thanks,
 George

gvasick · Answer

Chris, Sherlock,

Thanks for your comments.

Since I do not have consistent monthly breakdowns in all of my budgeting categories, I use the graph view with "Yearly" specified in the second dropdown on the budget page.   Leaving the unplanned expenses in the budget allows the spending displayed on the budget page to match the total shown under the spending tab with "This Year" selected.  This gives me a good crosscheck for any errors in my tracking.

I believe Sherlock's latest comment captured what I am trying to do: determine how much over budget I will be by the end of the year if I make no adjustment to my remaining planned spending.  It is basically the sum of the red overbudget items in the budget status column of the yearly graph view.  The sum needs to be adjusted for duplicates that occur when subcategories are rolled up into their parent categories.

I was able to calculate my total overbudget amount by exporting the current budget report to excel and correcting for the subcategory amounts rolled up into their parent categories.  I used excel's countif() function to exclude the subcategories, i.e. those with ":" in their names.

Thanks,
 George

Sherlock · Answer

You may want to consider applying a tag the unexpected expenses.  Their total would represent how much over budget you would be if you made no adjustments to your spending.

Chris_QPW · Answer

Let me first let me say that I don’t fully understand can make any year predictions when you only have actual amounts for part of the year.  That is where the reminders fill in the gap.  Even if that reminder is say weekly or monthly amount that you skip when the real transactions come in.
But you seem to have a way so I will just post an idea about the “unplanned” expenses.

Since it seems that it is the unplanned expenses that are throwing you off why don’t you create a new category for them and then just leave them out of the budget?