Sectional budgets

Open the section and choose Set up budget on the Section Budget card. Pick Share of subs, each term, then the subs schedule, then the share: a fixed amount per young person (say £10 of every £30 termly sub) or a percentage.

The card then shows the rule, for example £10.00 per young person of Termly subs each term.

To put each young person's subs into their section's pot when they're actually paid, rather than allocating a term's share by headcount, choose As subs are paid when you set up the budget. Pick the subs schedule and how much of each payment goes to the section, say £10 of every £30.

That amount is one rule on the schedule, so every section set up this way gets the same share of its own young people's payments. Siblings on one invoice each count for their own section, and part payments and refunds are shared in proportion. There's nothing to allocate or recalculate.

An existing budget can switch: choose Edit, then Change to: As subs are paid. What's in the pot already stays.

The amount here goes to the section's General pot. To send part of each payment to another pot in every section, such as Camp, add it on the subs schedule's Purpose & splits. See Collecting subs.

Add an event's planned income and expenses on its Budget tab; the first line starts the budget. The card compares planned with actual money so far, and says what closing would carry into the pot.

When you Close budget, Scout Suite asks whether a surplus goes back to the section. Choose Return to section budget and it's added to the pot as an Event surplus. For an event with several sections, Whose money is this? on the same tab picks which section's pot it goes to, or the group.

In Finance, income and spending can be tagged to a section so they come out of, or go into, its pot, and show on the section spending report.

When a section has more than one pot, the section spending report (Finance → Reports & compliance → Reports, Section spending) also lists how much went in and out of each pot. Money split into a pot from a payment schedule isn't counted as the section taking money in: like a term's subs share, it's the group's money set aside for the section.

When the group pays card fees itself (Settings → Financial connections), a card sale or a split line tagged to a section puts its whole amount in the section's pot; the fee comes out of the group's general money instead.

A section's money can sit in more than one pot: General, which everything starts in, plus any you add with Add a pot, such as Camp or Equipment. Move money shifts an amount from one pot to another; the section's total stays the same. A pot can be renamed, and archived once it's empty. Tick Add it to every section's budget when you add a pot to give every section one with the same name.

When money is tagged to a section that has more than one pot, a Pot choice appears next to the section: in Explain transaction, on cash float entries and on card spend. An event's Whose money is this? has one too, so a camp's surplus goes into the Camp pot when its budget closes. Anything without a pot goes to General.

Money can also arrive in a pot by itself: a payment schedule's Purpose & splits can send a fixed amount of every payment into a section pot as it's paid. See Collecting subs.

Each Event surplus or Event deficit in the card's recent activity names its event, with a link to it. If an event's budget was closed by mistake, or before all its money was in, open the event's Budget tab and choose Reopen budget. The surplus or deficit comes back out of the pot, and you can close it again when it's ready.

To correct the balance by hand, choose Adjust balance on the Section Budget card. Add, Take away or Set the balance to an amount, say why, and the card shows what the balance will be. Starting again from £0 is Set the balance to £0. The earlier entries stay in the history, with your adjustment and reason added.

To remove a section's budget altogether, choose Edit, then Delete budget. Its pots and their history go with it; money tagged to the section stays tagged to it, and you can set up a new budget afterwards.

Finance → Reports & compliance → Reports starts with Pots at a glance: where all the group's money is. Each section's pot (and its pots, when it has more than General), the group pots restricted to that section beneath it, then the group's other pots, the money each event is holding until its budget is closed, and the General group pot: what's left of everything the group holds (in the bank, card takings on their way and cash in hand) once the pots and events are taken off. Choose any line to see its transactions. A section without a pot says so rather than showing £0.

Each section's sidebar has Money: its pots and their balances, any group pots kept for it, and its events' money in and out. Choose a pot to see every transaction in it: allocations, subs shares, event surpluses, money tagged to the section and moves between pots. They add up to the pot's balance. See every transaction on the Section Budget card opens it too.

An event's Budget tab lists everything under Transactions: places paid (by invoice number and young person), refunds, bank, card and cash spending, payment fees and leaders not yet paid back. They add up to its surplus or deficit.

A group pot's transactions open from Pots at a glance, or from Finance → Budgeting → Group pots with View Details, including bank lines and donations tagged to it.