Create a Forecast Budget in Dynamics 365 for Finance

Posted on: June 15, 2020 | By: Christopher Rusing | Microsoft Dynamics AX/365

The budgeting module in D365 has essentially three levels of complexity that you can setup while configuring your system. We have basic budgeting, budget planning and budget control. Budget planning involves how budgets are created and approved within D365. Budget control limits transactions within the system based on predefined rules. In basic budgeting, you will setup budget codes and budget models to allow you to upload a budget to D365. Once that budget is uploaded and posted in D365, you can use those numbers to compare against actuals in the financial reporting tool Management Reporter (MR). That is the simplest way of utilizing the functionality of basic budgeting. However, what if you were looking to upload a forecast of your budget? D365 does not offer advanced financial planning and analysis functionality that you might see in an ISV, but there is a little-known functionality within D365 that offers you the ability to create a forecasted budget. The forecasted budget can be compared against the actual numbers and the original budget in MR as well. Let’s see how you can set this up.

 

First, you want to make sure you have a new budget code with the budget type Preliminary budget.

Next, go ahead and upload your budget using that new budget code that references the budget type – preliminary budget. Once you have that uploaded and posted, go into MR and find the column definition related to your actuals vs budget report definition. You might see that in previous columns, the attribute filter is set to original budget or original budget + revision + transfer. You will need to add another column and add the attribute filter for ‘Budget type’ with the filter being ‘Preliminary budget’. This will allow you to have a column that is pulling only your forecasted budget numbers. This column can then be used like any other column in MR to achieve the analysis you are looking for.

I hope this blog has been helpful in providing guidance and information on how to better utilize your budgeting module and financial reporting tools within D365 so that you can perform further financial analysis without purchasing more software. If you are looking for additional information, please feel free to reach out to us at info@loganconsulting.com or (312) 345-8817.

All the best!
Logan Consulting
www.loganconsulting.com



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