Report Basics. Where do I go for additional help? How do I navigate to the report?

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1 Report Basics What is the purpose of this report? The Account Summary report provides a summary of revenues and expenses by account for current period, encumbrances, year to date and inception to date. What key business questions does this report answer? How much revenue or expense is incurred in a given Account or chartstring in a month? How much revenue or expense is incurred in a given Account or chartstring YTD or ITD? What is the outstanding encumbrance in a given Account or chartstring for the current month? Who uses this report? Individuals with Financial Management functions at any level in an academic department program or center, and anadministrative or central department. Individuals responsible for managing or tracking multiple departments, programs, sites or projects How often is the report refreshed with data? Nightly How do I navigate to the report? 1. Log into the Prime Portal ( 2. Click the Reporting button to open the Cognos application. 3. Click the Financial Management folder. Where do I go for additional help? For technical and business questions: o Until September 30, 2014: Prime Support Center (PSC) Phone (609) prime@princeton.edu o Starting October 1, 2014: Financial Service Center or OIT Help Desk For training materials, go to the Prime portal ( and navigate to Information & Training > Training & Step by Steps > Financial Management & Reporting. Revision 00 Page 1 of 6

2 Using the Report What key prompts should I use to run the report? Field Fiscal Year Accounting Period Department Fund Account Program Site Project Description Required field. The 12 month period used for Princeton financial reporting beginning July 1 and ending June 30. You cannot run this report for a period that spans multiple fiscal years. Required field. The month in which certain financial events took place. July is period 1, August is period 2, September is period 3, and so forth. Required field. Organizational unit responsible for revenues and expenses, and typically contains people and a budget. You can run this report for one or more Departments. Used to track the source of funding. You can select one or more Funds. When no selection is made, the report returns data for all Funds. The natural classification of revenues (tuition, endowment income, grant), expenses (salaries, supplies), assets (cash, property), liabilities (accounts payable, accrued liabilities), and net assets. You can run this report for all or selected Accounts. When no selection is made, the report returns data for all Accounts. An activity owned and managed by one or more departments, academic programs, or individuals. The activity typically spans Funds, Accounts and Departments while aggregating expenses and revenues around a common purpose. Program does not disaggregate balances tracked in other ChartFields. You can run this report for all or selected Programs. When no selection is made, the report returns data for all Programs. Tracks buildings and properties that have a need to capture income and expenses (i.e., property or building where the revenue is generated and costs incurred and/or being performed). You can run this report for all or selected Sites. When no selection is made, the report returns data for all Sites. A collection of detailed transactional information related to grants, non grant sponsored research, and capital projects with specific beginning and end dates. You can run this report for all or selected Projects. When no selection is made, the report returns data for all Projects. Revision 00 Page 2 of 6

3 Sample Report Note: Sample report displays test data. Revision 00 Page 3 of 6

4 Sample Report (continued) Note: Sample report displays test data. Revision 00 Page 4 of 6

5 How do I interpret the report? What else should I consider? Column Name Description Item Description Account Category A roll up of lower level general ledger accounts used on summary financial statements to simplify analysis. Layout and format Similar to the way data is organized and subtotaled in the Fiscal Year Budget vs. Actual Report. Beginning Balance Pos/(Neg) Current Period Year to Date Encumbrance YTD + Encumbrance Net of Revenues and Expenses carried forward from the previous fiscal year. This is the beginning balance as of July 1 st. Actual Revenues and Expenses incurred in the accounting period selected on the Prompt page. Actual Revenues and Expenses incurred in the selected fiscal year up to the accounting period selected on the Prompt page. Unpaid commitment on purchase orders and Labor Accounting lines as of the selected accounting period. Commitments that are not recorded in the financial systems do not constitute an encumbrance, therefore, are not included. Actual Revenues and Expenses incurred in the selected fiscal year up to the selected accounting period plus encumbrance. Grouped by Account Category Additional totals Total Revenues after Transfer Total Expense includes subtotals for Personnel and Non Personnel Expenses Drills from which report(s) Drills to which report(s) Fiscal Year Budget vs. Actual Reports Transaction Detail by Chartstring Revision 00 Page 5 of 6

6 What tips & tricks can help me use this report effectively? When you perform a search on the Prompt page, you can enter a wildcard (%) at the beginning, middle, and/or the end of your search criteria. Wildcards are used in place of unknown characters if you do not know the exact value for a prompt. To specify a Department(s), you can use the Select and Search prompt. Or, to select multiple departments or an entire organization, use the Tree Prompt to drill down through the Department Hierarchy data. To drill to the Transaction Detail by Charstring report, you can click the blue hyperlinks (under the Account Category or Current Period columns). For more information about navigating the Prompt page, refer to the Cognos basic navigation courses. For more information about chartstrings and ChartFields, refer to the Choose the Right ChartField page on the Prime Portal. Revision 00 Page 6 of 6