Allocation and Entries

The Allocation and Entries utility allocates a total dollar amount to selected Funds based on the relative balances in a selected range of General Ledger accounts The allocated entry will be made to the debit and credit accounts that you select.

You can enter the amount to allocate at run-time, or a percentage (for example, 100%), of the amount in the basis accounts.

The basis values can be either from a selected General Ledger account range or from a selected Fund Balance, and they are calculated either based on the average daily balance in the selected account range or Fund Balance, or based on the YTD balance as of the end of a period or total current activity over a range of periods.

The allocation that this utility performs is based on a balance in the selected account(s) – either YTD at the end of a fiscal period, or on the total activity for a range of fiscal periods. The Allocation performed in the FACTS module, on the other hand, is based on average daily balances. However, if you post FACTS first, you could base the Allocation and Entries on any account allocated by FACTS (for example, Interest Income), and the resulting allocations would also be based on the average daily balance in the pool.

The accounts that allocations are based on are often different than the accounts to which entries are made. For example, if you want to transfer 25% of the annual available amount from named unrestricted Funds to a combined unrestricted Fund for Grant making, the basis account might be the Spending Policy transfer account, and the entry accounts might be a transfer for Grants and an asset account.

NOTE: Sometimes the basis account is the same as one of the entry accounts. For example, if your policy is to transfer realized and unrealized gains earned by non-permanent Funds participating in the pool to the operating endowment, after the FACTS post you could base Allocation and Entries on the gain account, set the percentage to allocate to 100%, and debit the gain account (credit the assets in pool). You would also need to make a manual entry for the cumulative amount to the operating endowment.

Note: The following example allocates interest earned in a Money Market account to all Funds that participate in that account.

1. In the General Ledger module, click the Journal Entry supertab, and then click the Automatic Entries tab.

2. Select Allocation and Entries from the Automatic Entries list, and then click the Run Process button. The Allocation and Entries window opens.
Allocation and Entries Window

3. In the Base Allocations on the G/L Data Period fields, enter 00 through the desired period (if you want to base the allocation on YTD balances).

4. Make sure the Apply Date is appropriate for your case.  FIMS will generate journal entries based on the fund coding in existence for the year associated with the apply date and not with the date in the calculation.  In the above example, although the calculation is based on 20006 values, the journal will be posted in 2007 ( for a calendar year user).  Thus the coding structure in 2007 should be used for journal creation.  Alternately, if the apply date were to be 2013, then the journals would use the fund coding for 2013.

5. In the Base Allocations on the Value of G/L Account fields, enter the appropriate General Ledger accounts.

6. In the Enter Amount to Allocate field, enter the total amount that you want to allocate.

7. In the Debit Account field, enter the natural account number for the appropriate asset account.

8. In the Credit Account field, enter the appropriate revenue account.

NOTE: The Use One Fund for Debits and Use One Fund for Credits checkboxes are rarely used. They are designed only for the few organizations that have organization-level assets, but keep activity accounts and balances at the Fund-level. Please contact FIMS Support if you need help with these options.

9. (Optional) If you want to run the process for a limited selection of Funds, click OK. The Fund Selection Criteria window opens.
Fund Selection Criteria Window

10. Use the fields on this window to select the appropriate Funds.

11. Click OK.

12. Verify the Send To destination, and then click the Run Report button. The Allocation and Entries report opens in the FIMS Viewer.
Allocation and Entries Report

13. Click Create G/L Entries on the FIMS Viewer menu bar. The Debit and Credit Information window opens.
Debit and Credit Information Window

14. In the Journal Key fields, enter the Journal Key code that you want to apply to the Debit and Credit entries (for example, AE to indicate an Allocation and Entries transaction).

15. (Optional) Enter a Reference number for the Journal entry.

16. Enter the Apply Date for the transfer.

17. (Optional) Enter the FACTS Confirm Date for the transfer.

18. Click OK. A confirmation window opens to ask if you are ready to create entries.

19. Click Yes. When the process is complete, a message appears to tell you how many entries were created.

NOTE: You must post the new entries for them to affect the General Ledger.

Saving Allocation and Entry Defaults

If you have any standard defaults that you employ here regularly, you can click the Defaults button in the Allocations and Entries window and save the settings. When you run the process again, you can load the defaults instead of typing in the information again.

1. In the Allocations and Entries window, configure the desired settings and click the Defaults button. The Defaults Maintenance window opens.

2. Click the Add button. The Saved Defaults Description window opens.

3. Enter a brief text description of the default settings, and then click OK.

4. Click the Update button to pull the current settings into the new default record.

5. When you are finished, click Done. 

Tip: Using Allocation and Entries to Make Transfers for Unrestricted Grant Making

Some organizations prefer to keep the available balance within their named unrestricted Funds until it is needed for Grants. When the annual cash requirement value is calculated, it is moved to available for each named unrestricted Fund, but without sweeping the balance to the general unrestricted Fund.

This method allows the named unrestricted Funds retain the investment earnings until Grants are made from the combined unrestricted Fund.

NOTE: You can run the Fund Balance Report to see the total available balance at any time.

After you make your first round of unrestricted Grants, you can run Allocation and Entries to sweep a proportional share of the Grants from each named unrestricted Fund to the combined Fund.

• In the Base Allocations on the G/L Data Period fields, enter 00 through the period of the Spending Policy transfer to available.
• In the Base Allocations on the Value of G/L Account fields, enter the appropriate Spending Policy transfer account (the debit: transfer from non-available).
• Enter the total amount of the unrestricted Grant making as the amount to allocate.
• Debit the transfers to the Grants account and credit the asset account.
• You should exclude the general unrestricted Fund from this selection. For that reason, it is important to distinguish it from the named Funds (for example, by giving it a distinctive code). You may wish to use the code that determines donor restrictions on spending (the Type or Sub Type code). It is a good idea to make these codes alphabetically contiguous. Allocation and Entries can also make selections based on the Admin Fee code and Spending Policy code. Either of these may serve to distinguish the general unrestricted Fund.