Budget, Actuals and Balance discrepancies

Doug Dubowski

I have set up an annual budget broken down by month. I am having issues with the "Balance" column in the budget. The Balance, as I understand it, is the difference between the budget and actuals that are cumulatively rolled over month by month. When I look at my budget, the "balance" number is correct for the first month (January) for the budget and actuals, but then starts to deviate the second month and it never seems to right after that. I also don't understand the term "Rollover Reserve" that shows up on the budget Annual View at the bottom of the monthly columns. I can't find anything that describes what this is.
Any help appreciated.

Chris_QPW

For each category you can choose one of three possible settings for a "rollover", none, rollover balances, or rollover only positive balances.


First try clicking on the Rollover help, and see if that answers your questions.

Next I will mention that if you click on the balance link it will give you this, which might help:


Last I will mention that since the balance is budget - actual, and the "actual" can include future reminders, then the Budget Actions -> View options -> Include Reminders might also need to be taken into account.

Doug Dubowski

Thanks for responding. Under "Budget Actions -> View options -> Include Reminders", it is not selected, so I am not including any reminders in my actuals tallies.

Where I seem to have the issue is in the top line roll-up, not individual expenses/line items. The Balance seems understated for the numbers that are available. The "Balance to Date" rolled up number does not match the existing month's Balance, if I add December's budget to my Balance or Balance to Date, it does not equal the Balance number for December, and the 2021 Summary Balance is a different number than all of those. Really quite weird.

Chris_QPW

Without seeing any examples, I can't venture even a guess of what you might be seeing.

Doug Dubowski

Ok, found the issue. I had a few categories that did not roll over from month to month, creating an "imbalance" in my numbers. Once I made them roll over, the numbers made sense.

Chris_QPW

That’s great, I’m glad you found the problem.

Doug Dubowski

Thanks for your help!