Apple Mac2014 - Page 232

QuickBooks for Mac 2014 User’s Guide 222
Graphing a budget
After you set up your budget amounts, you can view a graph that shows your budgeted vs. actual amounts. This
lets you see the variance between your budgeted amounts and the actual amount you earned or spent.
To graph a budget:
1 Choose Reports > Budgets > Budgets vs. Actual Graph.
2 (Optional) When QuickBooks displays the graph, click the Dates button to change the date range for
the graph.
3 (Optional) Click any button on the graph buttonbar that allows you to group the data in a different
way.
Creating reports about your budget
QuickBooks offers six types of budget reports. You can create these after you set up a budget.
To create reports about your budget:
1 Choose Reports > Budgets.
2 Choose one of the following reports:
o Budget Overview: Shows monthly budgeted amounts for each income and expense account for
which you have entered a budget amount.
o Budget vs. Actual: Shows monthly budgeted amounts for each income and expense account for
which you have entered a budget amount, including the actual amount you spent for each
income and expense account, and the difference between your budgeted and actual amounts.
o Profit & Loss Budget by Job Overview: Shows total budgeted amounts by customer and by job for
each income and expense account for which you have entered a budget for a job.
o Profit & Loss Budget vs. Actual by Job: Shows total budgeted amounts by customer and by job for
each income and expense account for which you have entered a budget for a job, including the
actual amount you spent on each job, and the difference between your budgeted and actual
amounts.
o Balance Sheet Budget Overview: Shows monthly budget amounts for each balance sheet account
for which you have entered a budget amount.
o Balance Sheet Budget vs. Actual: Shows monthly budget amounts for each balance sheet account
for which you have entered a budget amount, including the actual account balances as of the last
day of the month, and the difference between your budgeted and actual account balances.
Some tips to see how you're doing against a budget
If you set up budget items for:
Do this:
Income and expense accounts
only
Use the Profit & Loss Budget vs. Actual report.
Click Filters on the report buttonbar to limit the report to specific
income and expense accounts, or to just one account.
Customer or job only
Use the Profit & Loss Budget vs. Actual By Job report. Choose either