D365 Finance and Operations Budgeting

Use Budgeting to set up, create, and view budgets. Budgeting can include budget control, which you can use to monitor the budget funds that are available for planned and actual purchases and expenditures. You can create budget register entries for the original budget, budget transfers, and budget revisions. You can also create budget register entries for encumbrances and pre-encumbrances for purchases and planned expenditures. Budget register entries can be created automatically when budgets are transferred to the general ledger from other modules, such as Project management and accounting or Fixed assets.

You can determine which financial dimensions from the chart of accounts are available for basic budgeting and budget control. When you configure budget control, you define budget intervals, budget cycle time spans, budget thresholds, budget managers, budget groups, and the calculation that is used to check for available budget funds. The available budget funds can be verified when source documents and accounting journals are entered. You can view the status and history of budget register entries, budget control statistics, actual versus budgeted amounts, budget details, and budget funds available.

In Budgeting, you can configure and set up budget planning processes based on the budget cycles and ledger for your organization. The budget planning processes contain stages and workflows that automatically route budget plans for review and approvals. You can compare and analyze the budget plans that contain data in multiple scenarios, so that you can develop and adopt optimal budget proposals that work well for your organization.

Get started

The approved budget for a legal entity is maintained in a document that is known as a budget register entry. The lines in a budget register entry document are known as budget account entries, and contain financial dimension information, dates, and the amounts of the approved budget. The budget register entry document is integrated with basic financial reports and inquiry pages where ledger actual amounts are compared to budget amounts.

There are multiple methods for creating budget register entries in Finance and Operations:

  • Manually enter the document information on the Budget register entries
  • Use the Microsoft Excel template that you can open by clicking the Open in Excelbutton on the Budget register entries
  • Use the Budget Account Entriesdata entity in Data management to import budget register entries.
  • If the company uses Budget planning functionality to prepare budget data, you can use the Generate budget register entryperiodic process.

The budget register entry is considered completed when the budget balances have been updated. On the Budget register entries page, click Update budget balances for a selected budget register entry or multiple entries. After you update the budget balances, the status of the budget register entry changes to Completed.

Completed budget register entry can’t be re-opened for edits. Therefore, if the budget data must be adjusted, you must create a new budget register entry instead of correcting data in the completed budget register entry.

Budgeting lets you set up, create, and view budgets. It includes Budget control, which you can use to monitor budget funds for planned and actual purchases and expenditures. You can also set up budget planning processes based on the budget cycles and ledger for your organization.

Configure

When you configure budgeting, start on the Budgeting parameters page. On this page, you must define the budget journal, the number sequence for budget register entries, and the default behavior in the workspaces.

Next, if there are policies that govern the approval of budget register entries, based on budget type (for example, transfers or revisions), you must create budget register entry workflows on the Budgeting workflows page. If there are scenarios where transfers might be allowed without workflow approval, you can define budget transfer rules to support those scenarios.

On the Budgeting dimensions page, you must select the financial dimensions that are used for budgeting, based on the dimensions that are used in the chart of accounts. You can select all financial dimensions or a subset of them for budgeting.

Define a budget model that corresponds to all or some of the budgets. You can use a single budget model for all budget register entries. Alternatively, you can create separate models that are based on the budget type, the geographical location, or some other way that a budget can be classified.

Budgeting includes three primary configuration keys: Budget, Budget control, and Public Sector. Budgeting also requires additional information that you must compile before you set up basic budgeting or budget control.

Budget planning has requirements that you must complete before you configure budget planning, such as setting up the budget organization hierarchy, creating budget plan templates, and setting up Budgeting workflows.

Review a summary about the setup for basic budgeting and budget control. Create a budget for your organization. Establish budget amounts for the financial dimension values of the financial dimensions that are enabled for Budgeting.

Configure budget planning and set up budget planning processes. Create budget plan templates for Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word. After you create budget plan templates, you can create Excel worksheets and Word justification documents that are linked to the budget plan tables.

Create an Excel template for budget plan worksheets by using a wizard. You can decide which fields to use for the worksheet header, which columns to include, and which matrix fields to create. Each template is specific to a legal entity and an account structure.

Define budget planning elements, such as budget plan scenarios and budget planning stages, that you use when you set up a budget planning process. When you set up a budget planning process, you combine the budget planning elements into a single process for a budget cycle, ledger, and budget organization hierarchy.

Select a proposed asset or a proposed project for a budget plan line. Proposed assets are placeholders for fixed assets that are planned, but that have not yet been acquired in Fixed assets. Proposed projects are placeholders for projects that are planned, but that have not yet been created in Project management and accounting.

Use

Create budget amounts by entering budget register entries.

View budget register entries to help you track and audit budget activities.

Review examples of how budgeting and budget control show the balances and results for budget register entries, and examples that describe manual budget reservations and how to set up a budget group.

Review a scenario of how to use budget control when you create a purchase order in Procurement and sourcing.

Manually create a budget plan and submit it to workflow to be routed through your organization for review and approval.

Create or update budget plan scenarios by using information from an external source. The external source can be the general ledger, other budget plans, fixed assets, or human resources. The steps are the same, regardless of the source.

Reports

The budget manager can review the current state of a budget in the Ledger budgets and forecasts workspace. The Expense over budget and Revenue under budget tabs provide a quick view of the financial dimension combinations where budget targets aren’t being met or are approaching the threshold. You can personalize the budget threshold percentage and financial dimension sets that are used on those tabs by clicking Configure my workspace. You can click Unit managers to see the workers who are responsible for specific financial dimension combinations that are selected on those tabs. For example, if you see that the expense budget of the Operations department is going over the budget threshold, you can easily find and contact the Operations department manager to discuss the issue.

Budget control enables organizations to create a robust plan for their expenditures and ensure they always have enough budget to purchase the things that are important and the things that need to efficiently run the business. Since excessive spending can have an unfavorable impact on corporate profits, budget control helps organizations to ensure spending limits are adequate and in control. With Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, you can efficiently manage financial resources and plan, measure, manage, and forecast financial resources throughout the fiscal year for improved efficiency.