Budget

The Budget area lets you plan what a production should cost and watch how the real spend tracks against it.

You will find it under Resources in the menu on the left. It has three tabs: Budget, Actuals and Profit & Loss.

Screenshots show the light theme. The app looks the same in dark.

How to plan a budget

Build your budget while the production is still in Planning if you can. A plan written in Planning locks when the production moves to Pre-Production. From then on you record actual spend.

If you did not build one in time, you still can. A production past Planning with no budget categories of its own keeps an open plan. Once you start it, it stays editable until the production moves to its next phase, and then it locks. The Budget tab tells you which of these applies.

1. Open Budget ▸ Budget.
2. Add a category, such as set, costumes, rights or marketing.
3. Give the category a budgeted amount.
4. Add sub-items inside a category to break it down, each with its own amount. The category total is then the sum of its sub-items. You never type a "Total" line yourself. To add several similar lines, use Duplicate on a sub-item and edit the copy.

Back to contents

How to show what a sponsor or grant pays for

A sponsor or a grant often pays for named costs, up to a limit, and wants to know afterwards what its money bought.

1. Add the sponsor as a sub-item under an income category, with the amount they are giving. For example: Carter's Whitianga, $750.
2. Under that sub-item, choose Funds….
3. Tick the expense sub-items it pays for, then Save.

Under the sponsor's line you then see what it funds, planned and spent side by side, and how much is left: Funds 2 lines · planned $400 of $750 · spent $330 · $350 left. If the ticked lines come to more than the sponsor's amount, the line turns red and says how far over it is. Each funded expense shows Funded by the sponsor's name.

An expense can have one funder. Funding is part of the plan, so it locks with the plan.

Back to contents

How to record what you actually spent

1. Open Budget ▸ Actuals.
2. Add a transaction against the category or sub-item it belongs to.
3. Give it a description, an amount, a date and who paid.

Prompter shows plan against actual, with the variance for each category and an overall total. You can see where you are under, over or on track.

Back to contents

How to see whether the show made money

Open Budget ▸ Profit & Loss. It totals income against expenditure for the production as a whole.

Export PDF, at the top right, gives you a copy for the committee.

Back to contents

The three lines Prompter fills in for you

Every production has three lines Prompter keeps up to date: Box Office ticket sales, Box Office fees and Audience contributions. You can spot them by the padlock and the words "Auto from Box Office".

You can still set a target on them. Type what you hope to take at the door and Prompter shows the variance the same way it does for any other category.

You cannot type the actual figure on these three. Prompter fills it in from real ticket sales as they happen. You also cannot rename them, delete them, or record a transaction against them.

Box Office fees usually reads zero. Your buyers pay the booking fee and the platform fee on top of the ticket price, so your company banks the ticket price whole. That line only shows a figure where money genuinely came out of your account.

Audience contributions reads zero until you let your buyers round their total up, which is off until you turn it on. It is kept apart from ticket sales, because a round-up is a gift and not payment for a seat. Your treasurer needs to tell the two apart. See Box Office.

Back to contents

Currency and access

Amounts are shown in your production's currency.

The Budget is a Manager-level area, alongside Show, Auditions and Timeline.

Back to contents