This chapter covers the following topics:
Budgets are used in Oracle Marketing to supply funds for campaigns, events and other marketing objects. Approval rules determine the budget approval process and direct the approval workflow. Budget funds are released for marketing objects only after approvals are received. This is the start.
Budgets are not divided by organization. However, they are stored with the organization ID according to the responsibility of the user who created the budget.
When a user creates a Budget it is created with:
Responsibility ID of Budget creator
Organization ID (Operating unit ID) of Budget creator.
You must create the Operating Unit ID from the Default Operating Unit profile that you created for the user. Creating this profile is mandatory. The Oracle Marketing Super User responsibility does not automatically have access to budgets.
For example, John is the owner of Budget A and does not have the “Oracle Marketing Super User” responsibility. User Mary has “Oracle Marketing Super User” responsibility and is a team member with edit metrics capabilities for budget A. The field “category” on the Budget is locked by locking rules. John cannot update this field even though he is the owner, while Mary can.
The table below explains the access security levels for Budgets.
| Security Level | User Name | Access Control |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | AMS: Admin Group | Updates all fields:
|
| 2 | Owner | Updates all fields:
|
| 3 | Team members with Edit Metrics | Updates all fields:
|
| 4 | Team members without Edit Metrics | View Budget only |
| 5 | Everyone else | No access, no view |
Budget Categories serve two purposes:
Budget Classification: Configurable ways to classify a Budget. When classifications are used, Budgets can be divided into sales, marketing, or partnering purposes. For example, if a Budget classification for Partners exists, a category, “Partner Marketing Funds” can be created.
Approval Rule Setups: These rules determine who gets to approve Budgets and under what conditions they can approve them. Approval rules can be either root Budget approval rules or Budget approval rules.
Navigation: Administration > Marketing > General > Category
Notes
Created For: Budget
Enabled: Select this check box to make the Category available
Prefix: These are used as a prefix for the Budget numbers that are generated automatically.
Valid Activities: This is optional. Activities defined here will be used to evaluate the Budget eligibility of Campaign Activities.
Approval rules determine which users can approve Budgets and under what circumstances their approvals are applied. Approval rules for Budgets can be configured using multiple parameters. For example, Budget approvals can be based on amount or approval organization.
Approval rules are evaluated based on the following hierarchy:
Business Unit = 6
Organization = 5
Approval Object Type = 4
Budget Category = 3
Custom Setup = 1
The higher the number, the more important the parameter when determining which approval rule applies to which particular Budget.
Approval rules are contained in the package ams_approval_pvt and the file containing the code is amsvappb.pls.
Navigation: Administration > Marketing > Initiatives Setup > Approval Rules
Notes
Approval Rule For: Name of person to whom the rule applies
Root Budget Request: Select this if defining the rule for who gets to approve a Budget and under what circumstances
Budget Request: Select this if defining the rule for who gets to approve a marketing objects' request for funding and under what circumstances
Organization: Displays a list of operating units. Select the operating unit for which this approval rule will apply. The operating unit is created out of the default operating unit profile set up for a user.
Setup Type: Custom setups created for Budgets purpose
Minimum Amount and Maximum Amount: Define the range of Budget amounts or Budget request amounts that will fall into this approval rule
Approvers Section: This table enables you to define the people who will be approving the Budget:
Order:
Type: This can be Function (for customization purpose), Role (defined for marketing and assigned to Resources), or User (a user type)
User/Role: Depending on the Type selected above, this may display a list of functions, roles or users
Start Date: The date starting from which the approver is active. Within the range of the approval rule, each line can also have a start date and end date.
End Date: The date when the approver stops being the approver.
When creating a Budget, the list of values for the Business Unit field comes from Organizations defined in Oracle HRMS. When defining any internal organization in HRMS, you have the ability to classify the organization using “Type”. One of the type options is “Business Unit”. This Type serves mostly for classification purposes.
Navigation: Work Structures > Organization > Define
Notes
New: This enables you to define a new organization or query for a particular organization.
Type: Business Unit
This organization will now appear in the list of values for Business Unit in Oracle Marketing Budgets.
Companies can create Budgets, as well as other marketing objects in multiple currencies. Marketing automatically does currency conversion based on the conversion rates defined in the profile AMS: Default Currency.
Users can transfer Budgets and request money from Budgets in any currency. It is not required that the Budgets sourcing these requests is in the same currency. When a request for money is made in one currency, the user will see the approval notification and money transfer in that same currency. Similarly when Budget Owner receives a request, the system will automatically convert the requested amount into the currency of the Budget. The Budget owner will then approve the amount in Budgets currency.
Although the system has a default currency, a user can specify a different default currency. To change the currency default for a user, the user must first exist in the system.
Navigation: Profile > System
Notes
Log in to Oracle Forms with System Administrator responsibility
Application: Oracle Marketing
Profile block: Enter %JTF%PROFILE% and search for the profile
After changing the default currency, log into Oracle Marketing as the user for whom you changed the default currency. Navigate to Profile > Personalization > Display Preferences and verify whether the currency preference is correct.
A Budget goes through the following main system statuses:
Draft: Budget amounts are entered but not approved.
Pending approval: Budget is being reviewed and needs approval before it becomes active.
Active: The Budget is active and can be used to fund activities.
Approval rules are used to determine the route from Draft to Active. Approval rules are highly configurable and multiple can be created based on the Budget's characteristics.
| Status | Description |
|---|---|
| Draft | Budgets in draft status can be updated at any time in any way. Draft status may be updated to Pending Approval or Cancelled. It can also be updated to Active directly in case the Budget owner is also the owner of the parent Budget, and the parent Budget is already Active. |
| Pending Approval | The Budget has been submitted for and is awaiting approval. After all approvers have responded positively, a Budget may become Active or On Hold. If approvers reject the Budget it will become Rejected. |
| On Hold | On Hold is an interim status that is used when Budget has already obtained approval, and is just not completely ready to be made active. At On Hold status, a user can then manually change it to Active or Closed. |
| Rejected | Budget approvers have rejected the Budget. From Rejected, the status can be manually changed back to Draft. |
| Active | A Budget that has been approved and is ready to fund various activities and promotions. From Active, the status can be changed to Closed and Cancelled. |
| Cancelled | Indicates the Budget has been aborted. From Cancelled, the status can only be changed to Archived. |
| Archived | The Budget can no longer be used. This cannot be changed to any other status. |
| Closed | From On Hold or Active, Budget status can be manually changed to Closed. It indicates that the Budget has ended and is no longer available to fund activities and Offers. |
A Budget status changes once it has been updated. Approval rules determine who can change Budget status and under what conditions.
To access Budget Request screen, the proper security access level for the users must be enabled. For more information see Implementing Budget Security
Additionally, you may need to define multiple Transfer Reasons to record the reasons for each request. To do so, extend the Lookup “AMS_TRANSFER_REASON”.
Budget Reconciliation enables a marketer to return the previously committed, but un-utilized funds, by transferring them from the Committed column to the Available column ("Reconcile Un-Utilized") for marketing objects, such as Campaigns. This functionality should not be performed by all users. As such, this function needs security control.
Budget Reconciliation Security is based on:
Custom Setups: Enables or disables the Reconcile button to exists on the Budget side navigation menu.
Responsibility: User responsibility levels enables or disables access to the Budget side navigation menu (regardless of Custom Setup). This can be controlled by including or excluding a function during responsibility setup.
Including or excluding the Responsibility for Reconcile: Whether a user's responsibility allows him to access the Reconcile button inside the Budget side navigation menu (regardless of the above function) can be controlled by including or excluding another function just for the Reconcile portion. This is controlled during responsibility setup.
Offer Start and End Date: The Reconcile button will only appear if the Offer's end date has been reached and status is completed, or if Offer has no end date its status should be completed.
To enable Automated Reconciliation, run the concurrent program AMS-TM: Release Committed Budget Amount After Grace Period.
Budget roll-up view is a way for each Budget to display the amount for itself and also the amount summed up from its children. The roll-up summed view is its own Budget amount + all descendent Budget amounts.
This features gives an organization a high level view of all Budget balances summed up to each level. Activities and usages can be viewed by drilling down into different numbers such as committed and utilized portions of the Budget. When drilled down from a Roll-up View, the details will show for the Budget itself and all of its child Budgets.
For example, a Budget called “California” has committed amounts of $10K. A Budget called “Oregon” has $20K. Their parent Budget “Western US” funds no other activities, its Roll-up View committed therefore = $30K.
To enable the Budget roll-up view, set the profile option AMS: Universal Currency profile option at site level. This stores the one currency which is used to convert to all other currencies. In addition, for each user, set the JTF_PROFILE_DEFAULT_CURRENCY. This view of the roll-up is specified by the user's preferred currency.
Notes
Log in to Oracle Forms with System Administrator Responsibility and set the profile AMS: Universal Currency at the site level.
For each user, set the JTF_PROFILE_DEFAULT_CURRENCY at user level. This determines what currency a user will see in the Budget Roll-up View.
Log in to Oracle Marketing and navigate to the Budget tab.
Select Roll-up View.
Self View will show all amounts for the Budget, whereas Roll-up View will show all amounts summed for the Budget itself and all Budgets underneath it.
The Roll-up View converts all Budgets to the profile currency as set up. Because the profile is set at user level, different users will see the Roll-up View accordingly.