FRS Workshop

Forecast Entry Form

Forecast Amendment

Revised Forecast Column = Current Budget + amount in Forecast Amendment column

Future Income/Expenditure

Revised Forecast Column = Commitment + Actual + amount in Estimated Future Inc/Exp column This option mirrors what Monitor did and is therefore recommended for our schools

Grouping

Group by Cost Centre/Cost Centre Description when inputting forecasts as this will give you subtotals which you can use to work on. Ignore individual lines within the CC as these will show overspends against nil budgets.

Note

• Future Income/Amendment is entered as NEGATIVE and Future Expenditure is entered as POSITIVE within the blue column.

Forecast Notes Entry Form

FRS keeps it’s records

With Monitor there are 2 camps of people, those who like the fact that you start with a blank page each time, and those who wish their notes would be kept. FRS will flip this around, in that it keeps its notes and forecasts, therefore pleasing those people who didn’t like Monitor for this reason and annoy those who like this feature.

If and when you get your approval for your estimates, then these figures need to be entered into FMS and then amended within FRS for the next report to Governors.

All notes will be allocated a number. This will be the number of the line within the report and will not be a neat Note 1,2,3 but more like Note 2,14,67. We have requested that this be masked in reporting in future so that the 1,2,3 could be used to make reporting simpler for Governors to follow.

Best Use

• Each column can have up to 1000 characters
• Sort by Variance to see all the areas that may require notes all together

Cover Page Form

B/fwd Figure

This is the value of the Fund(s) for the previous year stated with FMS

How can I check the figure?

Reports – New Reports – General Ledger – Balances and Reserves. Retained Earnings or Carry Forward figures should match the Cover Page. There should be a Capital Fund B/Fwd figure that should be input into the blue line within the Cover Page

In Year

This is the value of the current Fund Allocation stated within FMS

How can I check the figure?

Reports – Budget Maintenance – Annual Budget Listing – Cost Centre Summary This is the sum of monies allocated to the Cost Centres and the Totals should match the Cover Page Set the fund to your Capital fund(s) to get the figure to input within the Capital line.

C/fwd Figure

This is the sum of B/Fwd + In Year + Current Year Income + Current Year Expenditure

Forecast Figures

These figures include your Estimated Figures and may give a truer position for C/Fwd.

More than 2 Funds?

You can use the Cover Page but you will need to replace the Figures section with a Summary Report by Fund Code. Simply run both reports and export both to Excel. Then use Copy and Paste to insert the Fund Summary into the Cover Page output. Then you can Save As to PDF to get your revised Cover Page.

Ways Forward

Cost Centres (in FMS)

Prefix your CC description (name) with the CFR Code or a school specific numbering system. As FRS arranges your reports by CC in alphabetical order, this will group the cost centres together. Using the CFR codes seems to mirror the Monitor layout and is being recommended for Plymouth Schools.

Centrally Invoiced

The Centrally Invoiced column does not automatically calculate in the Forecast Entry page and is not a default column. However you can bring in this column from the Column Chooser so that you can see if any amounts are pending.   Please do not add/subtract them in your Estimated Column as these amounts are included within the reports so you would be double-counting them.

Estimated Figures/Revised Forecast

These are not included within the Report totals but are included within the Cover Page (Forecast Totals). This is because the estimated figures are just that – if and when they are approved by your Governing Body, then the amounts should be entered into FMS and therefore will be shown in the correct place within the next FRS reports.

Layouts

These can be emailed so if you are in a Federation/Chain Academy structure, you can share your reports to save time. Also there are templates available from the Local Authority in some cases so please check with your Finance Officer before reinventing the wheel.

Edited Column shows ticks that aren’t valid/Commitment isn’t showing

These appear to be refresh issues within FRS. This has been reported back to HCSS who developed the software. If you get these issues, please exit FRS and login back in again. This simple fix usually sorts these quirks out.

More Information

·        Within FMS – Help – Documentation – Handouts – FRS User Guide

·        https://faq.scomis.org/kb12389/

·        http://staff.devon.gov.uk/cr/dfs/schoolsfinance/frs_guidance

Reviewed 13/04/2018