Operating Expense Process Flow
Planning and budgeting uses a bottom-up forecasting approach, where budget owners use historical Actual expense detail to create their departmental operating expense Forecasts. Forecasts are based on trends or entered manually by Account or by detailed Item lines.
OpEx Forecasting tasks include creating, validating, and adjusting the operating expense Forecast during the Forecasting phase.
Creating the OpEx Forecast
The budget owner uses the OpEx by Dept and the OpEx Detail forms to create the operating expense Forecast. The budget owner can also use the OpEx Predictive/Spread form to create Forecast values from predictions.
Validating the OpEx Forecast
The budget owner uses the OpEx Predictive/Spread form to analyze the expense trend in compared to historical Actuals. This form helps to access accuracy based on historical trends.
The finance executive views the following OpEx components:
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The OpEx Trend Dashboard to analyze the expense trend by Account and Department.
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The OpEx Dashboards to analyze expenses by Account and Department in more detailed level and to analyze year-over-year trends.
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The OpEx to Revenue Dashboard to analyze expense amounts relative to revenue.
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The OpEx Predictive/Spread form to analyze the expense trend in relation to historical Actuals and assess accuracy based on historical trends.
Adjusting the OpEx Forecast
Finance executives use the OpEx Top Level Adj form to analyze spending by Account and Department in a list format. Navigation starts at the top level and lets you drill down to specific Department and Account intersections.