Budgets and reports by department

If you use departments, you can set a budget for one department's spending in a category, and narrow every report down to one department. Both work from the Department picked on each transaction and bill.

Before you start#

1. Set up your departments in Settings > Departments. See Set up departments.

2. Pick a Department on the transactions and bills you add. Entries with no department only count toward whole-workspace budgets and the All view of reports.

Add a budget for one department#

1. In the menu, under Money, click Budgets.

2. In the form under the list, choose or type a Category.

3. In For, pick the department instead of The whole workspace.

4. Type the Monthly budget and click Add budget.

The new row is named after the category and the department, for example "Supplies · Front office". It counts only spending in that category that's tagged with that department.

You can have a budget for the whole workspace and one for each department in the same category. Adding a budget for a category and department that already has one updates the amount.

How department budgets show on the page#

• They have their own rows, bars, 6-month history and status (On track, Close to the limit, Over budget), like any budget.

• The four boxes at the top (Budgeted for, Spent so far, Left this month, Spent outside budgets) only count whole-workspace budgets. Department budgets are a closer look at the same spending, so they aren't added in a second time.

• Owners and admins get alerts at 80% and when a department budget goes over, with the department's name in the alert. See Set monthly budgets and get alerts.

• The monthly summary email lists any department budget that went over, too.

See a report for one department#

1. Open Reports.

2. In the Department: row, click the department. Click All to go back.

The department stays picked as you switch tabs, and Download CSV uses it. You can pick a tag at the same time to narrow it further.

The 1099s tab ignores the department filter, because a 1099 must count everything you paid a contractor.

Common questions#

I don't see the For list or the Department row. They only show on the Business plan, once at least one department exists.

A department budget shows $0.00 spent. Check that those entries have the department picked, and that the category name matches. Capital letters don't matter.

What happens if we leave the Business plan? The For list and the Department: row on Reports are hidden, so you can't add new department budgets or filter by department. Department budgets you already set are kept but put aside: they no longer show on the Budgets page or the Overview, no alerts go out for them, and the monthly summary email leaves them out. Whole-workspace budgets keep working as before. Nothing is deleted, so if you move back to Business, your department budgets show up again as they were.