Frequently Asked Questions - FY2018-19 Budget Process

How do I capture capital projects and investments in revenue generating programs below the net operating line?

This is in reference to tracking below the line expenses that were approved as part of the FY18 Budget Process. Please refer to the FY18 Budget approval letter sent to your Dean last year to understand if below the line expenses were approved for your unit. If they were, they should be tracked using a management code.

"Reserve investments” expenses are tagged with the new Management CF1 code 3I00MC. This step will enable us to measure your progress against divisional targets (those expenses will be excluded when calculating performance to Net Operating Surplus/...

I wanted to confirm my interpretation of our budget "target."

I wanted to confirm my interpretation of our budget "target." My interpretation is that this is not the target for our surplus/deficit, but rather the amount that our budget needs to be lowered by. Is that right?

The budget target represents the amount the FY18 Operating Budget Net Operating Surplus/(Deficit) line needs to be increased by to meet your FY19 Operating Budget Net Surplus/(Deficit). For example, if your FY18 Operating Budget Net Surplus/(Deficit) was ($435K) and your target is $356, then your FY19 Operating Budget Net Surplus Deficit will need to be ($79K) or better to meet your FY19 Operating Budget target. We have included additional language in Appendix 1 of the FY19 Operating...

Should we be entering revenue quarterly to net to zero or should we be approximating the invoicing so that we have seasonality?

I have a question on how to best enter the revenue expected for our grants. The guidance is for the revenue to net to zero on the C&G, but when we've reviewed our quarterly statements, the revenue lines had been highlighted. Should we be entering revenue quarterly to net to zero or should we be approximating the invoicing so that we have seasonality?

They have stopped marking the revenue line items for Contracts & Grants. With that said, you should still align the revenue seasonality with the expense seasonality since most of the Contracts & Grants are cost reimburseable. If you have some grants that are not cost reimburseable and you have some idea of how they will be invoiced, you can adjust for that if it is material, otherwise have the revenue follow the expenses.

We normally receive a breakdown of what we receive in 71220 (TAS). Will that be forthcoming?

We have not sent out any other breakdowns in the past for account 71220 outside of what is included in your FY19 Operating Budget IDRs (Intersection Detail Reports). The FY19 Operating Budget IDRs have not changed except for the change I made to the EVCP TAS allocation amount. If you are referring to the IDRs, these can be found in your Division folders on google drive. For detail on the EVCP TAS allocation amount, your Dean should have received a letter outlining the updated TAS amount.

Could you let me know where the commitments unrelated to TAS are so I can check for our other commitments?

The other items should be included in your IDRs (Intersection Detail Reports) which you can find in your Division Folder on the google drive.

I'm working on my multi-year template and when I refreshed the template, the data I input disappeared after the refresh. How do I fix this?

You fix this by adding "=" in front of your number and writing it out in decimal format. So if you're entering $300,000 then you would input "=300". Or if you're adding 3%, then type in "=.03". For more detail, review the multi-year template job aid. There are Smart View training resources on the CalPlanning website and there is a special Smart View office hours...

How do we update changes in the general allocation (from one DeptID to another) in CalPlan?

We loaded what was in the permanenet budget as of January 31, 2018 to July 2018 (FY19) in CalPlan to account 71110. If divisions later make changes to the permanent budget, these changes should be noted with 74101 transfers in CalPlan as FP&A does not make these late changes for the divisions.

Under 71302 support I see a $ amount for my division. What is this for?

This is because $4.5M is being provided in FY19 as a one-time adjustment to academic units to help defray the cost of the 3% merit rate for staff salaries. This was entered in CalPlan to the benefitting units in the month of September in account code 71302.

​How are campus commitments calculated in the multi-year budgeting template?

​You can find the detail for these in the Intersection Detail reports (IDR) posted to your divisional folder in google drive. Besides an IDR for FY18 and FY19, there are IDRs for FY20 and FY21.

How do we address issues where ongoing campus commitments aren't reflected in the template in FY20 and FY21; should we plan for related transfers and/or expenses?

Please contact the DFL concierge at dfl_concierge@berkeley.edu with a subject line of multi-year planning process and identify the commitment not captured in the multi-year template