Table of Contents
Purpose
In this article, we will learn how to use various reports in Aspire to better understand your revenue and expense position.
We will review estimating expenses, estimating what will be available to be invoiced, new sales expectations, and some other helpful concepts for building a smarter budget.
Expenses
A simple work ticket pivot can be used to speculate monthly expenses based on estimated ticket activity.
See the screenshot below for recommended display fields and grouping.
Work Ticket Status should be filtered to only show Open, Complete, Scheduled, and Pending Approval. Scheduled Date Year should be filtered to only show the year you’re looking to analyze your budget for.
From this work ticket pivot report, compare the costs that have already been incurred vs what is remaining.
Subtract the total cost actual from the total cost estimated to determine the estimated remaining expenses for the month if all the anticipated work were performed. Note that larger work tickets spanning multiple months may inflate the estimated monthly expenses.
These anticipated expenses should be analyzed and modified to create accurate assumptions.
Revenue
Aspire can provide an idea of how much revenue will be invoiced in a specific period. There are two basic reports required to pull this data together.
Invoicing Assistant Total + Work Ticket Pivot Estimated Revenue
The Invoicing Assistant will show all services completed through the selected date and all fixed payment contract installments for that month.
The work ticket pivots will provide what work will be performed and completed this month that is not already in Invoicing Assistant. The same work ticket pivot from before can be used to gather this information.
There are two changes necessary. Work Ticket Status should be filtered to only show Open, Scheduled, and Pending Approval. Add Invoice Type and filter to display all invoice types except Fixed Payment.
April Invoicing Assistant = $30,355.30
April Work Ticket Pivot Estimated Revenue = $188,958.08
April Estimated Invoicing = $219,313.38
Invoicing Assistant shows what has been completed up through now, and the work ticket pivot shows what will be completed.
📌Note: The revenue column from the work ticket pivots is based on Earned Revenue.
Aspire cannot predict when the work will truly be completed and invoiced. Also, larger work tickets spanning multiple months may inflate monthly revenues. These anticipated revenues should be analyzed and modified to create accurate assumptions.
New Sales Pipeline for Anticipated Sales
An opportunity sales pipeline can be created to estimate your anticipated sales to be closed. To lean out the sales pipeline, assign a probability of 100%, 50%, or 0% to all opportunities.
Only allow 10% of all opportunities to be placed with a 50% probability.
Navigate to the Opportunities module and create a list view of the following:
Field Name | Filter Type | Value |
Status Name | In | Approved, Bidding, Delivered, New, Pending Approval |
Antic. Close Date | This Month | N/A |
Things to Know About Budgeting in Aspire
Accurate work ticket pivots require proper work ticket management.
You can change the anticipated start dates of services that have been postponed.
You should cancel work tickets that will no longer be performed based on the original contract
You can cross check the pivot report statuses and dates by drilling into service types, services, and properties to ensure accuracy.
When analyzing invoicing in work ticket pivots, additional calculations should be considered for large tickets spanning multiple months.
Reminder that Fixed Price Open Billing and Fixed Price on Payment Schedule invoice types can be invoiced during any opportunity status.