4CAST – Demo Notes - 4Cast Solutions Web viewYou can open an example.xls file from the ......

USER GUIDE

4Cast Pro

© 4Cast Solutions Ltd - 2013

CONTENTS

- OVERVIEW- PROGRAM VERSIONS- SETUP- COMPANY DATABSE MANAGER- FILE MENU

o Compact Databaseo Backup & Restoreo TB Import from xls fileo Import NL by Montho Import from Sageo Dimensions Import Sync & Dims Setup Wizard (Extra Module)o FX Import

-- TOOLS

o To Doo Plano Loan Calculatoro Journals

- ADMINISTRATIONo Set-up Optionso Chart of Accountso Balance Sheet Assumptionso User Management (Not available in LITE Version)o Company/CC Management (LITE Version – no CC’s only Companies)o Versioning/Copy Table (Not available in LITE Version)o Copy/Zero Time Series

-- FORECASTING

o Profit and Loss Account Forecastingo Balance Sheet Forecastingo Sales Forecasting (Extra Module)o Staff Forecasting (Extra Module)o Job Forecasting (Extra Module)o 5Yr Plan Tool

-- EXCEL

o Custom Excel Forecasting and Reporting

- GRAPHSo By Periodo Cumulativeso V’s budget

- REPORTINGo Stat P&L Accounts o Stat Balance Sheet o Stat Balance Sheet with Breakdown o Fundsflowo Cashflowo Mgt Accts PL


o Mgt Accts BSo Management Accounts Packo Plan Packo Accruals/Prepayments


OVERVIEW

4Cast Pro - the Business Consolidation, Forecasting and Reporting Package

Use 4Cast Pro to produce the narrative and financials for your 5 year business plan

Use 4Cast Pro to produce your Consolidated Monthly Management Accounts Pack complete with monthly rolling reforecast of performance to the year end

Use 4Cast Pro to produce your Consolidated Budgets

4Cast Pro is Designed for the Accountant in business or practice needing consolidation, budgeting, monthly re-forecasting and a monthly management accounts pack

4CastPro is essentially a corporate forecasting, budgeting and reporting system. It is designed for quick and easy collaborative business forecasting via your office network, distributable spreadsheets or the web(via optional asp web modules). All data is saved securely into a backend database.

The system works just as effectively for a single company, single CC entity allowing you to reforecast the business easily.

The jet (Microsoft Access) database is capable of storing the performance of the group/company over time in a standard group chart of account format. There is no need to worry about corrupt spreadsheet formulae or broken links. The model makes the whole forecasting process much quicker and more robust than relying entirely on spreadsheets. Most templates and all reports are exportable to excel should you wish to reformat or manipulate data outside the model.

It has templates for forecasting forward the performance, balance sheets and cash-flows of the various Cost Centres, Divisions or Companies within the group.

Actuals are easily imported from excel data exported from your Accounting System. Historical data is protected so that no one can change the past. It also allows you to make journal adjustments to imported data.

The model makes use of an intuitive ‘Spread/Fill’ feature which allows you to quickly and easily populate your financials.

It produces a full monthly management accounts pack (In Period, Year to Date, Full Year Forecast Format together with budget and last year comparison) and the financials for a 5 Year Plan exercise, essential when raising finance.

It can easily consolidate up the results of various group companies and provides a drill down capability to individual Cost Centres, Divisions or Companies within the group.

Unlike many purely financial forecasting packages 4CastPro covers forecasting Sales/Margins, Employment allowing you to drill down into the drivers behind a particular result or forecast and review performance in detail over time.


Collaboration - Spreadsheet Reporting and Forecasting make the system highly flexible to how you wish to work. You can distribute (Export) and collect (Import) sales overhead and employment forecasts from your divisions or companies in MS Excel Format. The whole NL database can be downloaded to a reporting spreadsheet the format of which can be tailored to your exact requirements.

Access is given via individual users having a unique Username and Password. Administrators can limit users to the forecasts for particular CC's or divisions. Access to Payroll information and Administrative functions can be assigned on a user by user basis.

All data is stored in 3 main forecast tables in the underlying database

NL – Nominal Ledger Data VOL – Sales Forecast Data EMP – Staff Forecast Data

The VOL and EMP tables store current and future data only in Forecast time series (ie periods 1-12)

The NL table stores data in the following time series including last year and budget time series:

NL TIME SERIES:PYACT Prior Year (Year before last) ActualsLYACT Last Year ActualsCYFCT Current Year ForecastNYFCT Next Year ForecastFYFCT 3rd Year ForecastFCT4 4th Year ForecastFCT5 5th Year ForecastCYBUD Current Year BudgetCYBUD2 Budget Version2 or Rebud

4Cast Pro also produces a first version of your business plan narrative via a series of questions and input screens which can then be exported to MS Word

Click on the icon throughout the program to reveal mini tutorials in html format. Alternatively help is available via the traditional windows help system.

4Cast Pro gives you a Company Selector facility on Login allowing you to setup and open different company databases (eg For an Accountant you could have one for each of your clients)

The program comes with a set of test data (Plantest.mdb). This data can be used to practice and test elements of the program. The currently selected database is shown in the bottom status bar


PROGRAM VERSIONS

Light - Single User/no CC's Pro - Core Network 1-5 usersAdditional 5 usersAdditional Modules: Reffx consolidation FAccounts (Dimensions) Link ISales Forecasting VEmployment Forecasting EJob Forecasting J

The Light Version is a single user multiple company consolidation product designed for those without complex requirements. It is designed so you can get up and running without any consultancy.

The Pro Version is designed so you can have multiple users on a network and allows you to purchase add-on modules covering more specialised requirements. It is worth buying consultancy days with this version of the product as setup is more complex.


SET-UP

The main set-up tasks are as follows:

Setting up the 4CastPro chart of accounts so it reflects your type of business and allows for the consolidation of all the individual company chart of accounts

Setting up the Main Products or Services that the Company sells and which are capable of being tracked through the underlying Accounting Systems

Setting up the Year End and Current Year Setting up the CC's and Divisions within the group Setting up Users and their access levels Configuration of the offline reporting spreadsheets & writing any reports to cover requirements

not covered by the 'canned' reports Import of previous years "Actuals" into the system

Dimensions Users – The Dims Set-up Wizard achieves most of the above leaving you to use the COA facility to fine tune where Accounts roll-up for reporting purposes

Both the TB Import and NL Import by Month allow you to initially synchronise the Accounts within a new database to your Trial Balance

Sage Users – Can perform a full Import which will also initially synchronise the Accounts with Sage

COMPANY DATABASE MANAGER

This facility allows you to open and manage your company databases. Each database can itself contain a number of different companies that you with to consolidate

Either double click on the required database or select the database and click open. Note there are two sample databases that can be used to familiarise users without any danger of doing anything wrong with the live database. They are PlanBenson.mdb and Plantest.mdb

If you want to create a new database type the database name you want in the “Company to Add/Copy to” box and click the “Add Company” or “Copy Company” button.

SET DATA PATH - When networking 4CastPro this facility allows you to change the data path from the local data path to the server data path


FILE MENU

COMPACT DATABASE

This facility allows you to compact and repair the underlying Jet database

BACKUP & RESTORE

This facility allows you to easily backup and restore the underlying Jet database

IMPORT

Use these facilities to import data from other systems. The system is highly effective at importing TB data exported from other systems in spreadsheet format.

TB Import from xls file

This is the normal month end import routine to pull in TB data from another system from an excel spreadsheet file with a named range 'tb'

The following fields (or columns of data) are required:

ACCT ACCTName CC CCName TYPE Balance

The whole range then needs to be named 'tb'. You can open an example.xls file from the toolbar on this form

“Initial Sync Accounts” on the toolbar allows you to initially synchronise the Accounts within a new database to your Trial Balance. 6 digit Company/CC’s eg 001FCT etc will be added automatically


NL by month Import

This routine can be used to pull in month by month data for a particular time series. Eg Budget or Last Year data can be brought in from an excel spreadsheet with a named range 'nl'.

The required figures in the spreadsheet are

P&L - Period movements Balance Sheet - Period End Balances

The following fields (or columns of data) are required:

ACCT ACCTName CC CCName ACCTGP ACCTGPName BF (The brought forward balance sheet balance) CYFCT_1 to CYFCT_12 (for example if bringing in Current Year NL Movements)

The whole range then needs to be named 'nl'. See nlexample.xls in import directory

The available time series to import data into are

CYFCT - Current Year Forecast NYFCT - Next Year Forecast FYFCT - Next Year +1 Forecast LYACT - Last Year Actuals PYACT - Last Year - 1 Actuals CYBUD - This Years Budget

“Initial Sync Accounts” on the toolbar allows you to initially synchronise the Accounts within a new database to your Trial Balance. 6 digit Company/CC’s eg 001FCT etc will be added automatically


DIMENSIONS Import/Sync

For users of Access Dimensions this facility allows you to

Easily Import monthly TB movements from Dimensions Import Payroll Data from Dimensions payroll Export Budget Data to Dimensions Accounts

Dims Set-up Wizard

This Wizard guides you through the steps necessary to set-up a new database that links to your Dimensions Dataset See YouTube demo

Import from Sage

Sage – When you install Sage it sets up a data source (DSN) & odbc drivers) on your machine. You need to supply the exact data source name & then click on ‘Import’ to bring in actuals to the current period. Full or partial synchronisation is possible. Full synchronisation replaces all NL accounts in the database with those in Sage for the selected company


http://youtu.be/ZTQvAGQVrEo

FX IMPORT from mdb

Use this facility to import a forecast from an overseas subsidiary company mdb file.

It is necessary to keep overseas subsidiaries in their own separate mdb file in their local currency. You need to ensure the COA in the subsidiary is a duplicate (or subset) of the main COA. This can be enforced by restricting user access to the subsidiary database.

This routine is then used to bring in the sterling equivalents. P&L and Balance Sheet data can be brought in at different rates eg if using average rate for P&L and closing rate for balance sheet.

The 'Get File' button is used to locate the overseas company database.

You need to specify the CC into which you are bringing the NL data. The program looks for a matching CC in the other database.

TOOLS

TO DO

A useful utility to keep track of ‘to dos’ and ‘ideas’ essential when starting up

PLAN

This is the basic plan narrative that can be exported to MS word for further editing/formatting to your requirements.

You can scroll through the pages of the plan using the Next>> or <<Back buttons or by clicking the buttons at the top

Once a page is complete you have the option to tick it as complete and therefore have an easy visible record of which areas of the plan are not yet complete.

All pages have ”i “ prompts that offer help on completing parts of the plan narrative.

COMPANY INFORMATION

Use this page to record your basic company details and who is preparing the plan

INTRODUCTION

This page gives further details of the type of business, history, mission statement etc

RESOURCES

This page records details of the key members of your management team, premises requirements, MIS requirements and your training and recruitment plan


SWOT

This page is laid out as you would a whiteboard for this brainstorming exercise. The idea is to identify all your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

MARKETS

This page gives details of your customers, markets and competitors and details of how you will promote your product or service.

PRODUCTS

This page gives details about your product or service.

LOAN CALCULATOR

A useful facility for calculating the repayments and interest on term loans

JOURNALS

4CastPro allows you to make journal adjustments to imported data. This could be used to make consolidation journals on a consolidation adjustment CC or to make adjustments you want subsidiary company Accountants to make to their ledgers.


ADMINISTRATION

USER MANAGEMENT

This facility is there for adding/deleting/administering users, setting their password and limiting their access to features of the system

Admin Access Yes/No

This checkbox determines whether user has access to the administration menu

Payroll Yes/No

You can choose whether to give user access to the Staff Forecast

Import

You can choose to give user access to the import facility even though they have no access to other administrator features

Div

A field that allows you to select which Division or CC the user has access to


CHART OF ACCOUNTS

This facility is designed to manage where Accounts rollup for reporting purposes. They are allocated first to one of the statutory account TYPES and then to ACCTGP’s within TYPE.

Once set is not an area that would frequently need to be used but if new accounts have been corrected and the application did not bring them into the correct account group then this is where changes could be made.

Once an Account Group on left hand tree is selected Type can be changed against the drop down list so they are shown in the reports as required.

Same applies to Account group


Click on the headings on the left and it filters the accounts visible and enables editing. The Toolbar at the bottom allows you to add/delete account groups

SALES(TYPE: INC)

ASSIGN/UNASSIGN PRODUCT ACCOUNT

The ASSIGN button allows you to assign matching Product Sales and Cost of Sales accounts. These are used by the Sales forecasting template as the summary accounts for the sales and cost of sales for a particular category of Product Sale.

ASSIGN/UNASSIGN QTY ACCOUNT

The ASSIGN button allows you to assign matching QTY Sales and Cost of Sales accounts. These accounts have access to the ‘QTY/PRICE’ drill down button on the P&L Account Forecast. Using this facility you can forecast sales cost of sales and stock levels in terms of a quantity x price calculation.


Balance Sheet Assumptions

There are 5 tabs that initially need completing to get the balance sheet to forecast itself as a result of changes to the Default DaysThis allows you to set default Debtor and Creditor days across all sales and purchase accounts

Fixed Asset MatrixThis allows you to set up 1 to 1 relationships between cost, accumulated depreciation and p&l depreciation charge accounts so that fixed asset and depreciation accounts forecast themselves


PAYE/NICYou can set up what % of gross payroll cost is PAYE/NIC allowing the PAYE/NIC creditor that is paid a month later to be populated on the balance sheet As a more accurate alternative you can choose to use the staff forecast to populate the monthly creditor on the balance sheet. You need to input allowances for each employee for this to calculate correctly

VATSet which period your VAT quarter ends and the VAT rate and maybe set a % vatable that applies to all accounts

Loan MatrixSetup 1 to 1 relationships between Loan accounts and their related interest accounts so you have a T account to populate for repayments and interest


CC MANAGEMENT

This facility allows you to setup a Company/CC(Cost Centre) hierarchy by adding and deleting CC’s and by adding and deleting CC nodes. The CC field is 6 digits long which allows a fairly complicated group structure to be catered for. When a CC is created all the Accounts setup under COA are copied across to this CC.

For Example 001WAL (Wales) ,001SCO (Scotland)

Character 1 ,2 & 3 – Company Character 4-6 – CC

You can setup a CC hierarchy – ie 201ADM, 201SAL, 202ADM, 202SAL means a group with 2 sub divisions and two companies reporting into it each with 2 CC’s ADM(Admin) and SAL(Sales)


A Group Node “______” allows you to consolidate at group level A Divisional Node “2_____” allows you to consolidate at divisional 2 level A Company Level Node “201___” allows you to consolidate at company 01 level

You cannot enter data at node level. If you need to enter data for say a divisional holding company then you need to set up a divisional company for it consolidating into this node.

A simple but effective way of allowing access and reporting at a sub-division level.

LIGHT VERSION

The light version of the program only uses the first 3 digits to identify the Company Level. The second 3 digits are always FCT. The ACCTGP’s can still be used to look P&L Accounts at branch or location level


VERSIONING/TABLE MANAGEMENT FACILITY

This facility allows the Administrator to add/delete versioning tables for comparison or scenario purposes.

Copy to Existing Table – Use where you are overwriting an existing table Copy to New Table – Use where you are copying to a new table Zero Main table – Use with caution to delete data in a main table eg on startup

You are not allowed to delete the main database tables NL, VOL, EMP or FA but you can copy them to a backup/versioning table as required.

Forecasts:

All Forecast Templates allow you to select the active version of a table. The Currently active tables are summarised in the main status bar.

Reports:

All reports report on the currently selected version as shown in the main status bar.


COPY/ZERO Time Series

Time Series – You can store data away in various 12 period Time Series. You have 2 budget time series and 2 prior period time series. You can then forecast in one of the 6 forecast time series.

This facility is used to manage data in the various NL time seriesAn example would be to copy budget data to the forecast.At the end of the year you would want to copy the last year to the prior year and current year to last year. Budgets could then be copied into forecast etc.The END OF YEAR PROCEDURE Move Data button allows you to move all Time Series with actual data in back 12 months and zeros the current year Time Series. Take care to take a backup before making any of these adjustments to ensure that data can be recovered in case of mistake.As the year progresses actual figures overwrite the previous forecast or budget figures in the Current Year Time Series. Under the Administration menu there is a facility for zeroing copying or moving Time Series data including a Year End routine to move data back 12 monthsBudgets can be imported or entered directly into the budget Time Series although it is best to budget for the following year in the Next Year (Year 2) Time Series and then copy this over into one of the budget time series


FORECASTING

PROFIT & LOSS ACCOUNT FORECASTING

Use this facility to forecast your Profit and Loss Account.

Use this facility to forecast your Profit and Loss Account. Dropdown menus allows you to select a Company CC, or a particular Time Series or Year eg the Budget or Last Year Time SeriesOn drilldown from the P&L Forecast (by clicking on this yellow arrow to the left of an Account) you get the following form where you can directly enter your forecast data You can also use the spread button feature to

spread an amount per month spread an amount equally over remaining months spread using a predetermined profile

Spread amounts are entered in the spread column

You can drill down to Account level by clicking the yellow button in left hand column of above screen:


The METHOD of each account can be set at this level. The Default is ‘ENTER’The alternatives are %SALES, %EMP, %ACCOUNT, %LASTYR, EMPLOY , PREPAY and ACCRUE. The % accounts give you a facility to set %’s on further drilldown

EMPLOY Accounts are used to set the accounts to be used to by the EMPLOYMENT forecasting to post forecast employment costs to the P&L. One needs to be set for each company/CC

If you select ACCRUE as the METHOD on cost/overhead accounts on further drilldown you are provided with a T account facility where you can enter say quarterly invoices and monthly P&L charges. The associated accrual/prepayment is then automatically included on a 1ACCR or 1PREP system account on the balance sheet

Sales Accounts can either be set to ACCRUE or PREPAYBy setting the METHOD of a sales account to PREPAY you can drill down to a template where you can accrue sales based on a number of days sales unbilled at the end of the month. The ACCRUE method on Sales works as for cost/overhead accountsAccrued Sales are debited to a system account 1PREPS - 'Prepayments - Accrued Sales' on the balance sheet

The METHOD of Corporation Tax and Dividend Accounts is automatically set to ‘PYT/CHG’. On drilldown you also get a T account facility for forecasting charges and subsequent payments


To summarise you can change the METHOD for each account from Enter to %Account etc. You can also set debtor or creditor days or setup a payment profile. The various methods are as follows:

METHOD DETAILSENTER Default method allowing entry of amounts on drilldown form%ACCT,%SALES,%EMP Used to set an account up as a % of an account or account groupACCRUE To set an account up with accruals and prepaymentsPREPAY To set up an accrued sales account based on % sales unbilledSTOCK To set up a COS account with a stock forecasting facility

EMPLOY To set an account up for direct posting of employment costs from the STAFF forecasting facility

PYT/CHG Auto set for Dividend, Corporation Tax and Loan type accounts

Certain accounts in the P&L are directly updated from other parts of the model. These accounts are not therefore updateable within the P&L account:

Depreciation is updated as and when the FA forecast is updated Those Accounts set with METHOD Employ are updated from the Employment forecasting facility

Functions at the top of the window as follows:“Print” – prints the current schedule“Export xls” – Enables you to export current view to an excel spreadsheet.“Flex”Allows you to apply global % changes to Sales, COS, Employment, Other Overheads or populate the forecast based on % increases on last year.

Withholding Tax on Sales/Costs – A % box on drilldown to Account level This is for Companies overseas who suffer withholding tax on their sales It also works for Suppliers where you deduct 20% under the Subcontractors scheme Each account can have a % set which then gets excluded from SL and PL projections A Sundry Dr or Sundry Cr account can be set as Method WHOLD – this then is accrued each month for

payment the following month to authorities or can be rolled up if days set to >180


“Recalc”This is a routine that needs to be run before viewing any of the main reportsIt carries out the following checks:

Brings profit through onto balance sheet and makes cash (System 1CASH account) the balancing figure Recalculates Trade Debtors and Creditors based on days Recalculates Depreciation, VAT, PAYE/NIC creditor Recalculates % of account calculations Recalculates Accrual/Prepayment accounts Ensures everything balances


BALANCE SHEET FORECASTING

By setting up various assumptions you can get the balance sheet to auto forecast itself meaning any changes to P&L data will feed through into the balance sheet and cashflow forecastDebtor and Creditor days and which accounts are VATable are setup against each Sales or Cost Account in the P&LYou define the relationships between Fixed Asset Cost and Depreciation Accounts together with depreciation method and rate. As you add assets the depreciation will calculate itself in the P&L and Balance SheetYou can set stock to calculate on stock daysVAT assumptions and PAYE/NIC assumptions allow these lines to be forecastAccruals/Prepayments – Various PL accounts eg rent/rates can be setup with an ACCRUE method. This allows you to enter T account movements

Use this facility to forecast your Balance Sheet. Dropdown menus allows you to select a Company CC, or a particular Time Series or Year eg the Budget or Last Year Time SeriesThe Balance Sheet Forecast is where you update your forecast of balance sheet accounts not updated from elsewhere within the model. You can drilldown to account level from the main forecast. At account level you can update the forecast for future periods. Past periods are protected and cannot be changed. You can either populate cells directly or use the 'Spread/Fill' button on that line to repeat spread or fill an amount across the months of the year. Certain accounts in the Balance Sheet are directly updated from other parts of the model or from the balance sheet assumptions. The following accounts are not updateable within the Balance Sheet forecast: • Fixed Asset and Accumulated Depreciation is updated as and when the FA forecast is Recalc’d• Trade Debtor and Trade Creditor accounts are recalculated and populated directly by the model• VAT balances are recalculated and populated directly by the model• The PAYE/NIC creditor account is recalculated and populated directly by the model


Factoring

You can assign an ‘other debtor’ or ‘other creditor’ account to be a debt factoring (or invoice discounting) account by giving it a METHOD of FACTOR. This means that under the balance sheet you can drill down at CC level to a Factoring Template allowing you to set a % of trade debtors facility and to set a required overdraft or bank balance figure for your forecasts. You can also set a factoring limit. This automatically calculates the debtor facility drawdown within the overall facility % and overall limits.


SALES FORECASTING

This facility can be setup to forecast your sales by key customer/ Product groupThe Product groups are setup under the COA facility by setting up one to one relationships between Product Group Sales and Cost of Sales accountsThis is not used by all companies as forecasts are often derived from other systems or methods

Under the Administration Menu - Setup-options you can choose a template with or without volumes

With volumes – Allows you to specify a unit selling price/unit cost price per line item then forecast volumes and sales/GP are calculated from the volumes entered

Without volumes – You specify unit selling price and GP%. Sales values are entered and GP calculated using the GP%

USING THE SALES TEMPLATE

The volume spreadsheet allows you to forecast your main sales prospects and keep track of the main customers you have sold to in the past. It is not anticipated that this feature is used to forecast every single prospect but only to keep track of the key customers or category of sale.

Past Periods, coloured blue/grey are closed off so you cannot change the past! You can however enter data into the current period so you have a historic record of your key sales by period.

Each prospect can be assigned a probability so that Probablised Revenue and Margins are saved back to the P&L Account by product

Data in the spreadsheet is sortable by clicking on the column headings with an up arrow in the column header eg by salesman or by product

It is possible to cut and paste the whole spreadsheet into a local copy of excel. You can select groups of cells and the sumselect total is displayed in the top column.


The prospects can be colour coded as required.

The choice of Products is setup in the 'Setup Chart of Accounts' option on the Administration Menu

ACTIONS

SAVE

The 'Save' button allows you to submit any changes you have made anywhere in the spreadsheet grid back to the database

PRINT

Prints the current spreadsheet

Export XLS

This exports the current data to a spreadsheet. You are given the option of opening this spreadsheet after it has been saved.

Set Probability

This facility allows you to globally change the Probability for all prospects. This is useful for seeing what effect a 10% reduction in sales would have

Set GP%

This facility allows you to globally change the GP% for all prospects. This is useful for seeing what effect a 10% reduction in GP would have.

Delete

The currently highlighted row can be deleted.

Add+

The Add Customer button and Customer Name box only appears when a particular CC is selected. These are used to add a prospect to the forecast.


STAFF FORECASTING

The Staff Forecast allows you to forecast your employment costs by employee. A tabbed interface allows you to select each year at a time.

You can cut and paste the whole datagrid into a local copy of excel or you can use the savexls button.

Current Year Employment Cost by month is summarised by employee in the columns on the far right of the grid.

Entering a start month (1-36) changes when the employee costs commence.

The INDIR/DIR choice establishes whether the employment cost for that employee is an overhead or COS item

Costs are posted to P&L accounts set-up as TYPE EMPLOY under COS or OEM

Pensionpc – This % field is used for an employer type add on cost eg Pensions

Erpc - This % field is used for a second employer type add on cost eg Employer National Insurance

Increase Start Month/Increase % - These columns allow you to build annual pay increases into your forecast.

ACTIONS

SAVE

The 'Save' button allows you to submit any changes you have made anywhere in the spreadsheet grid back to the database

PRINT

Prints the current spreadsheet

SAVEXLS

This exports the current data to a spreadsheet. You are given the option of opening this spreadsheet after it has been saved.


DELETE

The currently highlighted row can be deleted.

ADD+

The Add Customer button and Employee Name box only appears when a particular CC is selected. These are used to add an employee to the forecast.

ACCESS

The Administrator can determine whether a user has access to the employment page when setting up users


5 YR PLANNING TOOL

Use this facility to populate easily your plan for years 2 to 5 or 3 to 5 depending on which years you have computed in detail. You drill down on the yellow buttons to take you to a screen where you can apply % increases at account level.

You can populate the future years by inputting annual or Quarterly totals which are then spread equally over the relevant months.

You can use the inflate function to inflate each year by a different % across selected accounts (ie those you tick)

Using the CC dropdown is you select a real Company/CC rather than a consol node it will allow you to set tax and dividend %’s for each of the years for that Company.


EXCEL

Custom Excel Forecasting and Reporting

These facilities make use of 4Cast Pro's ability to open up excel spreadsheets within the program.

Custom Excel Reporting

This facility allows you to create customised reporting spreadsheets. The spreadsheets import from the database to a named range "NL" within the spreadsheet on opening. You can bring back Special Selection Summary fields as well as the ordinary database fields eg current period year to date (CYFCT_YTD)The following columns (fields) are required within the "NL" named range:Left Column "Import" - Imports where set to "I" or "INEG" for reversed signYou need ACCT, ACCTGP0 and TYPE columnsYou need a CC columnData is brought back from the database by specifying the CC and either ACCT, ACCTGP0 or TYPEYou then need one or more of the following Time Series Month or Special Selection fields:CYFCT_PER LYACT_PER CYBUD_PER CYFCT_1 to 12CYFCT_YTD LYACT_YTD CYBUD_YTD LYACT_1 to 12CYFCT_TOT LYACT_TOT CYBUD_TOT CYBUD_1 to 12 The named range needs to include all I columns and all selected data fieldsYou can have rows that are not I rows and columns that are not data columns for Formatting headings etcTo use the function you need to install an addin. On the machine you are using to access the application click the “Install Addin” button on the toolbar, this will then give you additional functionality in excel.The new addin appears as shown here in Excel.


To copy new reports – say one month to the next simply open the report you want to copy and then Save As and give it a new name, ensure the file is saved to the same directory as the existing files.To add a new page to a report it is easiest to copy an existing page and then modify as required.The key data is hidden to the left and top of the spreadsheet. As with any excel spreadsheet these can be locked and the spreadsheet protected in line with whatever security is required.

You can set-up up to 7 named NL ranges NL, NL1, NL2 etc in one spreadsheet to allow you to say setup a custom board pack spreadsheet. Below you can see the named ranges, you can simply add a new named range i.e. NL6 for a new page in the report


The top section provides the spreadsheet with the details of where to obtain the data, whether to show full

Above each column specify what period you want your data to come from

.

Custom Excel Forecasting

This facility allows you to create customised forecasting spreadsheets or writeback reports. These are ordinary excel spreadsheets that are stored in the 4CastPro\Custom directory. These spreadsheets can import data from the database on opening and can save data to the database on closing from a named range "NL" within the spreadsheet. The benefit is that you can take existing forecasting spreadsheets and integrate then into your 4Cast model in a controlled manner. You can protect the spreadsheet leaving only data entry cells available for input. You can hide the top row and two leftmost columns that control which lines import or export to the database. The user is presented with a forecasting template he can populate using a familiar excel spreadsheet.

There are also Template Custom reports you can use including writeback reports

eg SalesForecast or OverheadForecast templates. These allow you to setup spreadsheets at Account level that write back to the database by populating the Export column of the spreadsheet and hitting export xls on the add-in when ready to send data back to the database


REPORTING

REPORTING

Built in reporting is provided. These are in a fixed format.

Account – Management Accounts Format

The Management Accounts View allows you to look at performance against budget and against last year for the period, year to date and the full year. You can look at this with or without variances

You can look at same data by Year (5 Year Plan view) or by quarter

You can look at a crosstab view of the data by Company/CC

You can look at results at a Statutory Accounts Level


Balance Sheet – Management Accounts Format

PL Account – Statutory Accounts Format


Balance Sheet – Statutory Accounts Format

Fundsflow

Cashflow


PL Account by CC

Product Sales/Margins


PACKS

There is a canned Management Account Pack (for simple Board Requirements) and a canned 5 Year Plan Pack (Perfect for when the Bank need a Plan)

Management Accounts Pack

These Options allow you to print out a pack of Management Accounts/Plan reports for a single CC or all CC’s including Consolidated

This saves considerable time over setting up print macros etc when using a spreadsheet model

Plan Pack


4CAST – Demo Notes - 4Cast Solutions Web viewYou can open an example.xls file from the ......

Documents

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