Budget Advisor

Overview

Prospects™ allows you to create budgets to help you manage your finances. Prospects™ also allows you to create multiple budgets in the application as well. There are also ViewPoints associated with budgeting that enables you get a pictoral view of your budgeting (e.g., planned vs. actuals). Below you will find instructions on how to create a budget, edit a budget, and delete a budget. The Budget ViewPoints are also discussed below as well.

Creating a Budget

To create a budget, you must first have created at least one Binder (see the Binder Help page for more information). Once you have at least one Binder created you can click the plus sign () and select Budget in the drop down menu at the top of the window that is displayed:

You can also add a Budget by ctrl-clicking (right clicking) in the My Prospects side panel and selecting "New..." or you can click the action icon () and select "New..." as well.

Enter the name of the budget you are creating and a description if you'd like. Then check the "Make this the active budget" checkbox if you would like this budget's information displayed in the associated Budget ViewPoints. Click OK when you are finished entering information into the main budget window.

Click the plus sign () to begin adding in budget items. The following window will be displayed:

For each item that you are adding into the budget, select a corresponding category from the drop down list. Enter the amount for the budget item in the associated field and select whether the item is income, an expense, or allocated to savings. Then select how often the budget item occurs. The choices are as follows:

The drop down menu that is to the right of the occurrence drop down menu is used to specify when your budget item is applicable. This second drop down menu becomes active depending on your occurrence selection. For instance, if you are adding a budget item that occurs yearly, then you have to specify when during the year that budget item hits your account (i.e., Januray - December). Another example would be if you are adding a budget item that occurs ever other week, you have to specify whether that budget item hits your account this week or next week.

You can add in additional information for the budget item you are creating by utilizing the "Notes:" field.

You can specify whether or not you would like the item to be a goal in your budget by checking the check box titled: . You may want to utilize this option for savings goals and the like.

You can also specify whether you would like to only see items in your Budget Advisor that have exceeded your budgeted amount by checking the following check box: .

Once you are finished entering all of the information for the budget item you are adding, click OK. Your new budget item will appear in the budget table.

The Prospects™ Budget Advisor highlights income items in green, expense items in red, and savings items in blue.

Continue following the instructions above until you have all of your budget items entered.

If you would like to delete a budget item, you can highlight the item in the budget table and press the delete key or select the minus sign ().

Editing a Budget

To edit a budget, highlight the budget you wish you edit in the My Prospects column. All of the buget information for that budget will be displayed in the table. To edit a budget item, double click the item. The budget item window will be displayed and then you will be able to update the information for that item as needed. When you are finished making the necessary changes, click OK.

Duplicating a Budget

Prospects™ allows you to duplicate a budget easily. In the My Prospects panel, highlight the budget you would like to duplicate, ctrl-click (right click) the budget and then select Budget > Duplicate:

The duplicated budget will be placed in the same binder as the original. To edit the name of the duplicated budget, you can double click the budget in the My Prospects panel, highlight the budget in the My Prospects panel and then ctrl-click (right click) and choose the "Edit...", or highlight the budget in the My Prospects panel and click the action icon () and then select the "Edit..." option. After you are finished making your upduates, click the OK button.

You can begin editing the duplicated budget by highlighting it in the My Prospects panel and following the instructions in the Editing a Budget section of this Help page.

Activating a Budget

If you have created multiple budgets or if you did not click the "Make this the active budget" checkbox when initially creating the budget, you can make a budget active at any time by highlighting the budget in the My Prospects panel, ctrl-clicking (right clicking) and selectinig Budget > Make Active:

Once you have made a budget active you will see the following indication in the My Prospects panel: .

You are only able to have one budget active at a time. If you try to make a second budget active, the following alert will be displayed:

Select Yes or No depending on your preference.

Deleting a Budget

If you would like to delete a budget that you have created, you can highlight the budget in the My Prospects panel, click the action icon () and select "Delete..." or you can highlight the budget in the My Prospects panel, ctrl-click (right click) and select "Delete...":

You will be prompted to verify that you want to delete the budget:

Budget Advisor ViewPoints

Prospects™ has four ViewPoints associated with the Budget Advisor: Monthly Budget Amounts, Monthly Budget Left Over Amounts, Cummulative Budget Savings Over Time, and Budget Categories Breakdown. See below for more information on the Budget Advisor ViewPoints.

Monthly Budget Amounts

This ViewPoint allows you to see, in a bar chart format, your monthly budgeted amounts over the course of a year (starting in the current month). Your income, expenses, and savings will be color coded in the bar chart according to the following legend: .

Monthly Budget Left Over Amounts

This ViewPoint allows you to see how much money you have left over per month based upon your budget over the course of a year (starting in the current month). This information is displayed to you in a bar chart format as well.

Cummulative Budget Savings Over Time

This ViewPoint allows you to see how your savings will grow over time if according to your budget. This information is presented to you in a line graph format and will display cummulative budget savings amounts over the course of a year (starting in the current month).

Budget Categories Breakdown

This ViewPoint allows you to see the category breakdown for all of your budgeted items. This information is displayed in a pie chart format, one for income and one for expensees/surplus. If you hover your mouse over a pie slice, the corresponding category becomes highlighted in the legend. This ViewPoint also indicates what percentage each pie slice represents according to your budget.

You can navigate between the ViewPoints either by utilizing the drop-down menu selection to the left of the ViewPoint name () or by utilizing the left-right arrows to the right of the ViewPoint name ().