Spending By Category Georges Budget For Excel Reports

Applies to Excel template: "Georges Budget for Excel"

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Benefits of tracking spending by category in Georges Budget for Excel

Georges Budget for Excel helps you see where you are spending your money by allowing to you track spending by categories. Each transaction in the Excel checkbook registers is assigned to a category and each category is set a budget amount allowing you to compare budget vs actual for every spending category and also income categories.

Excel charts allow you to easily see how you doing within the month so that you can cut spending during the month so that you do not go over your budget that you set for the entire month. That is one of the main benefits of using personal budget software over just using a paper checkbook register or simple checkbook software where you just record transactions and keep track of a running balance and account reconciliation. While those are also important to managing your money, creating a budget and tracking if you are spending more then your budget and in which categories is an important part to improving your personal finances, cutting spending, saving money and getting out of debt and building wealth.

For example, you may be spending to much on eating out or entertainment and seeing the actual spending in those categories will help you see where your money is going on a monthly and yearly basis. Also the Excel checkbook registers allow you to split transactions into different categories so that you can bet a better picture of personal budget. These split category are then reflected in the reports and charts section of the Excel budget software.

 

How to use the Reports & Charts sheets in Georges Budget for Excel

Clicking the Reports & Charts macro button takes you to the Monthly Actual vs Budget Report. Do not use any other method to go to this report.

 

Monthly Spending By Category Budget Spreadsheet

 

You can change the month and year of the report by clicking the spin buttons located in the upper right hand side of the Excel worksheet. This allows you to track the current month and year and also view financial data for prior months and prior years if you have added that information in the Excel checkbook registers.

Once in the Monthly Actual vs Budget Report, you can click the button named "View Yearly Actual vs Budget Report". The Yearly Actual vs Budget Report totals the Income and Expense Categories for a particular calendar year and comparing them to the yearly budget amounts which is the monthly budget totals for each category multiplied by 12.

The Expense amounts displayed in the Monthly Actual vs Budget Report and Yearly Actual vs Budget Report have been multiplied by -1 for display purposes. For example, if there are transactions in the registers that show -300.00 was spent on groceries for a particular month, then -300.00 is multiplied by -1 in this report and will be displayed as 300.00 in this report for that particular month and category.

For Income categories and monthly Total Income, a green indicator light means that the Actual amount is greater than or equal to the Budgeted amount for a particular month.
For Income categories and monthly Total Income, if the Actual amount is greater than 0.00 and the Budget amount is equal to 0.00, then a green indicator light will be displayed.
For Income categories, if the Actual and Budget Amounts both equal 0.00, then the category and related 0.00 amounts will not displayed and hence, no indicator lights will be displayed in that scenario.
For monthly Total Income, if the Actual and Budget Amounts both equal 0.00, then the item will not display a indicator light, but the totals of 0.00 will be shown.
There are no other colored indicator lights for Income categories and monthly Total Income.

For Expense categories and monthly Total Expenses, a red indicator light means that the Actual amount is greater than the Budget amount.
For Expense categories and monthly Total Expenses, if the Actual amount is greater than 0.00 and the Budget amount is equal to 0.00, then the red indicator light will be displayed.
For Expense categories, If the Actual and Budget amounts both equal 0.00, then the category and related 0.00 amounts will not displayed and hence, no indicator lights will be displayed in that scenario.
For monthly Total Expenses, If the Actual and Budget Amounts are 0.00, then the item will not display an indicator light, but the totals of 0.00 will be shown.
For Expense Categories and monthly Total Expenses, a yellow indicator light means that the Actual amount is greater than or equal to 80% and less than or equal to 100% of the Budget amount.
There are no other colored indicator lights for Expense categories and monthly Total Expenses.

If a bar chart is visible, it will show a blue bar, or a gray bar, or a combination of blue and gray bars. If the gray bar is visible, it will represent 100% of the Budget amount. The blue bar represents what percent the Actual amount is of the Budget amount and it will range from 0 to 100%. The blue horizontal bars of the charts will be limited by those amounts but the percent amounts displayed are not limited by the those amounts.
The underlying Actual to Budget percent amounts that are displayed in the column to the right of the bar chart can be higher than 100%.
If the Actual amount is greater than 0.00 and the Budget amount is equal to 0.00, then the blue bar will display at 100%. Also the percent amount in the column to the right of the bar chart will display at 100%.
If the Actual Amount is less than 0.00 and the Budget amount is greater than or equal to 0.00, then the blue bar will not be displayed. Also the percent in the column to the right of the bar chart will show 0%.
If the Actual Amount and the Budget amount are both equal to 0.00, then the category and its related 0.00 amounts, bar chart, and percent will not be displayed.
There are possible bar charts for each individual category, monthly Total Income, and monthly Total Expenses that show % of Budget.
There are no bar charts for monthly Net Amounts and there are no indicator lights for monthly Net Amounts, however, for monthly Net Amounts, including Actual, Budget, and Difference, if the amounts are less than 0.00 then the font color will be red.

Note: Categories with Actual and Budget amounts both equal to 0.00 in a particular month will not be displayed.

Note: Categories with Actual amounts equal to 0.00 and Budget amounts greater than 0.00 in a particular month, will be displayed and totaled for the month that is selected, even if there are no transactions for that particular category within the selected time period (month/yr)

Note: Categories with Actual amounts greater than 0.00 in a particular month will be displayed and totaled, no mater what the Budget amount is.

Note: Categories with Actual amounts smaller than 0.00 in a particular month will be displayed and totaled, no mater what the Budget amount is.

There is a potential red or yellow indicator light for each individual Expense Category and monthly Total Expenses.
There is a potential green indicator light for each individual Income Category and monthly Total Income.
There are no indicator lights for monthly Net Amounts.

The Monthly Actual vs Budget Report and Yearly Actual vs Budget Report relies on your computers date. If the calendar date or time is incorrect, the reports and charts may be incorrect. Make sure your computers calendars date and time are correct.

The Monthly Actual vs Budget Report and Yearly Actual vs Budget Report is based on the all transactions in all the Registers, even if the Filter command is used to filter out (hide) some or all the transactions from a particular Register(s).

The monthly reports are based on the current month and prior months (the monthly reports are not based on months that have not occurred yet on the calendar). The yearly reports are based on the current year and prior years, (the yearly reports are not based on years that have not occurred yet on the calendar.)  So if you enter transactions in the registers for a future month that has not yet occurred in the calendar or the a future year that has not yet occurred on the calendar, the reporting is not going to show them.

 

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