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Input Forms

Input Forms are Hubble inquiries, designated to be a part of a Budgeting Cycle, which are used to input budget figures into one or more Hubble Ledgers. Forms can be associated to one or more cycles. Often many Forms are used within a Cycle.

Input forms allow users to input data into Hubble Ledgers through manual input, formulas via Excel Modeling, or a combination of both. Before inquiries can be added as input forms, they must be created and saved. Design is carried out within Hubble using standard techniques; however, the only additional piece required is the inclusion of one or more Hubble Ledgers that is defined within the Budget Setup dialog. Once defined in the Hubble Ledgers tab within the Budget Setup dialog, they can be added to the form and shown alongside actual amounts from your ERP.

Filters act in the usual manner. Say, for example, you wish to do multi-year budgeting or forecasting, you would include each of the years in the Year Filter. Standard features such as formatting, calculations and captioning can also be applied within forms.

Plan to utilize consistent forms and standard reporting features across your enterprise. Utilize Hubble to streamline your accounts, category and other codes to ensure proper data integrity during your budget process. This will ensure consistent budgeting throughout.

Specific Features in the Input Form

It is important to understand how the below special inquiry objects within Hubble work in an Input Form. These features when utilized in conjunction with Reusable Inquiry Objects, can greatly reduce the time required to update Input Forms cycle to cycle, year over year.

  • Selectors - Selectors provide dynamic reference for dimensions like period, year, or ledger (e.g. Current Budget Ledger). Selectors can also be referenced in filters, calculations, and models.
  • Time Series - Time Series provides rolling columns (e.g. columns defined with periods, years and even ledgers). Time series can help reduce the number of columns in the form by specifying the exact combination of Period and Years needed for each Ledger. Time Series can also be referenced in filters, calculations, and models.
  • Hierarchies - If a hierarchy is used in the rows of the inquiry, only those entries in the hierarchy which correspond to valid combinations will be available for entry.
  • Calculations – Calculations can provide suggested inputs, but data cannot be input into an Inquiry Calculation or a Hierarchy Calculation. This includes cumulative periods, such as CE12 or YTD.

Tip: Best Practice:

  1. Create fewer Input Forms by adding dynamic features, rather than many single use Forms.
  2. Utilize Time Series and Selectors that are saved into Reusable Inquiry Objects to quickly update many forms at once.
  3. Utilize ERP security and Scope to control which amounts are available to each user.
  4. Add the posting edit code as a filter in your input form and set the filter value so users do not budget to accounts that cannot hold data in JD Edwards.
  5. Leverage Comments to add additional support or notate underlying assumptions
  6. Maintain the natural accounting sign of your budget accounts. This will result in less confusion for all users, e.g. revenue input should be entered as a credit and expenses entered as debits.

Forms Tab

The Forms tab allows Budget Administrators to manage Budget Forms. The tab is accessed by selecting Forms from the Budgeting Menu or selecting the Forms tab from the Budget Setup dialog. From this screen Budget Administrators can Add, Edit, or Remove a Budget Form, view the associated Cycles, and manage Permissions.

Note: The columns can be sorted within this dialog by clicking on the column name.

Add or Edit an Input Form

The Add button allows you to add a saved inquiry from your Object Repository to the list of available Budget Forms. Forms included in this list are available to be included in one or more Budget Cycles. The inquiry itself remains stored in the Object Repository, not in the Budget Database.

Within Edit, you can name an input form, associate an inquiry, assign/unassign a Model, define a Model Cascade, or enable the Form to allow submissions without a valid Account ID.

Caution: Use extreme caution in setting the option to Allow Submissions without a valid Account ID. This should usually be turned off. Once it is turned on, it may become difficult to consolidate or roll up accounts. If your business requirements do require it to be on, do not turn it on and off within the same form; leave it checked or unchecked. More information can be found in the Summary Budgeting section.

View Cycles

Within Cycles, you can see which budget cycle is using the selected form:

Remove Input Form

The Remove button only removes the selected inquiry from the list of available forms; it does not delete the inquiry itself. An input form can only be removed if it is not currently in use by any cycle. The below message will appear when attempting to remove a form that is still in use by a Cycle.

Permissions

Permissions allows you to set permissions for the selected form. Contributors will need at least Read permissions to be able to open an Input Form where they are to view or enter data.

Form Requirements

By default, submissions are only allowed to a valid Account ID. The fields or dimensions that make up a valid account can vary based on your ERP and ERP Configuration.

Budget Entry is only allowed into dimensions selected via, Filter Selections, Selectors, Time Series, and Hierarchies. Values cannot be submitted to dimensions selected via a Calculation or Hierarchy Calculation. Enter Budget Mode will not be enabled when a duplicate combination of dimensions is present.

JD Edwards

Required Dimensions

Data input is allowed into cells where the following dimensions are present in a column, row, or single selection.

  1. Business Unit*
  2. Object Account*
  3. Subsidiary*
  4. Period
    1. General: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14
    2. Budget Cycle: BORG (Budget Original), BREQ (Budget Requested), BAPR (Budget Approved)
  5. Fiscal Year
  6. Ledger
    1. Hubble Ledgers

    7. Note: *These normally required dimensions are not required when the input form has been specifically marked to allow submissions without a valid Account ID. This functionality is described further in the Summary Budgeting section. Note - this may cause issues with uploading budgeting amounts to your ERP or comparing summarized budgets to actuals that reside in valid accounts.

Optional Dimensions

Values can be submitted into cells for these optional dimensions when they are present in a column, row, or single filter selection. When they are not present a blank value will be submitted.

  1. Subledger
  2. Currency
  3. Line Item Detail

Oracle E-Business Suite

Required Dimensions

For a value cell to be submittable, the following dimensions are required to be present as a column, row, or single filter selection:

  1. All segments/flex fields included in the full GL Code Combination*
    1. The required fields will vary depending on your EBS configuration.
  2. Period
  3. Year
  4. Values – PTD (Period to Date) or PND (Period Net Debit) and PNC (Period Net Credit)
    1. If PTD is used, the appropriate Net Debit or Net Credit amount will also be populated
    2. IF PND or PNC is used, it will populate and override any amount entered into PTD.
  5. Balance Type
    1. Include Hubble Ledger(s)
  6. Ledger
  7. Balance Currency
  8. Translated Flag

    9. Note: *These normally required dimensions are not required when the input form has been specifically marked to allow submissions without a valid Account ID. This functionality is described further in the Summary Budgeting section. Note - this may cause issues with uploading budgeting amounts to your ERP or comparing summarized budgets to actuals that reside in valid accounts.

Input Formats

Formatting can be customized in many ways. For a complete list of available formatting options, see the User guide for Designer and Power Users. The formats related to budget entry can be found on the Default tab of the Formatting dialog and are available to customize.

Input Formats:

  • Input Cell Style - cells where data is being entered
  • Input Cell Validation Error Style - cells which fail validation
  • Inserted Row Style - rows that have been inserted into a form by the user
  • Missing Row Style - displayed when the Missing Balances Feature is turned on, this is for rows representing accounts with a missing balance in the JD Edwards Account Balances Table (F0902)
  • Model Cell Style - used with all cells in which the Model Scope has been applied in Budgeting

Format of Budget Amounts

The budget amounts should be entered in their original form. For example, if using KMB formatting, enter 10,000 and it will then be formatted as 10k.

When applying formatting that changes the precision of the number (e.g. divisor, KMB, etc.), the precision that is displayed is what will be saved. For example, if 12,345 is entered and you have KMB formatting, it will become 12.3K. This will be saved as 12,300.

If you want to have more precision, you should adjust decimals on the formatting. For example, if 12,345 is entered and you have KMB formatting, then 3 decimals should be defined, and the entered amount will become 12.345K. This will be saved as 12,345.

To change the format of these rows, do the following:

  1. From the Formatting menu, click on the Default tab.
  2. Select Item to be edited and click Edit.
  1. Edit the formatting as desired within the Define Formatting Style dialog.
  1. Click OK to exit the Define Formatting Style dialog.
  2. Click OK to exit the Formatting dialog.

Comment Columns

The ability to add Comment Columns is leveraged in Input Forms to note additional support, document underlying assumptions, add review notes, etc. When in Enter Budget Mode, comment columns are editable by default.

Note: If you already have the Comment Column added to your report when you go into Enter Budget Mode, the Comment Column is also available for input at the same time.

Comments and Performance

Comments are stored at the report level. If there are many comments on a report/input form, this can potentially negatively impact the performance of that report.

Comment Columns and Hierarchies

Comment columns can be used with hierarchies. When adding comment columns to a report that has a hierarchy with expand and collapse enabled, you must be cognizant of your sort order if you want expand and collapse to function. The Comment Columns need to be at the top of your sort order and set to ascend if you want to keep the expand and collapse feature of your hierarchy functional.

Line Item Detail and Comment Columns

Comment Columns can be associated to the Line Item Detail Column, however, Comment Entry will be disabled for newly inserted rows until that row is saved. See the section on Line Item Detail for more information.

Comments and Budget History

Comments are tracked and copied to the Budget History Table if used, however only in two scenarios:

  1. The row associated to the comment must have a budget amount entered. If no budget amount has been entered, then the comments are NOT tracked in the Budget History Table.

  2. You must use ‘Enter Budget’ to enter in your comments. If you use ‘Enter Comments’, they will NOT be written to the Budget History Table.

    If more than one comment column resides on the input form that a budget change was made to, then the comments will display together on the Budget History report in one Comment Column and are separated by a comma:

Line Item Detail (JD Edwards Only)

Line Item Detail allows a user to budget at a detailed level using ad-hoc detail rows. Line Item Detail is a column available on the GL and JC Balances Templates in Columns, Sorting & Grouping under Available Columns. This column is only available for users with a BUD Budgeting License.

Other important notes regarding Line Item Detail:

  • Each Line Item Detail label must be unique for a given account. Duplicates are not allowed.
  • Amounts stored in Line Item Detail rows are available in all reports using the same Hubble Ledger and column combinations, even in reports other than where the Line Item Detail was entered.
  • Amounts stored with Line Item Detail, will appear on a separate row than Actuals or other Ledgers without an identical Line Item Detail description.
  • You can use the QBE (Query by Example) line on Line Item Detail.
  • You cannot pivot Line Item Detail.
  • You cannot create a filter for Line Item Detail.
  • You cannot base a Hubble Calculation on the Line Item Detail column.

Add Line Item Detail Column

To add or remove the Line Item Detail column to an Input Form, follow the below steps.

  1. Open your input form which was created from either the GL or JC Balances templates.
  2. Go to the Design menu and click Columns, Sorting & Grouping.
  1. Add the Line Item Detail column as a displayed column.

    2. Note: After the above steps have been completed for a form, Line Item Budgeting Processes can be carried out on the Web. For details of this procedure, refer to “LineItem Budgeting Process on the Web”. Otherwise continue following the procedure below.

Insert New Rows of Line Item Detail

To Insert New Rows of Line Item Detail, follow the below steps. Note, these steps will only be available once Budget Setup has been completed for the Input Form.

Insert New Row

  1. Click Enter Budget from the Budgeting Menu to enable Enter Budget Mode.
  1. Click Insert New Row from the Enter Budget Menu, or Right Click on an existing line and select Insert New Row.

  1. A new row will be inserted directly above the selected line. You can add multiple rows by clicking on the icon multiple times. The description and amount for the line item detail can then be completed.

  1. Click Finish or Save & Continue to save the Line Item Detail entry.

Insert from Clipboard

  1. Click Enter Budget from the Budgeting Menu to enable Enter Budget Mode.
    1. Copy the data that is to be inserted.
    2. Data can be copied from an Excel Spreadsheet (shown below), a Hubble Report, or many other places.

  1. Right click on the desired row and select Insert from Clipboard.
  1. The appropriate number of rows will be inserted, containing the data that was copied into your clipboard.

  1. Click Finish or Save & Continue to save the Line Item Detail entry.

Deleting Rows

  1. Click Enter Budget from the Budgeting Menu to enable Enter Budget Mode.
  2. To delete a Line Item Detail row, highlight the row and click on Delete/Clear Row either by right- clicking or by going to the Enter Budget Menu and selecting Delete/Clear Row.

Line Item Detail and Comment Columns

Comment Columns can be associated to the Line Item Detail Column. If adding Line Item detail via a workspace in the web, Comment Entry will be disabled for newly inserted rows until that row is saved.

Steps to add a Comment Column associated to the Line Item Detail Row:

  1. Add the Line Item Detail Column to the Input form.
  1. Add a Comment Column and associate it to the Line Item Detail column.

  1. Go into Enter Budget Mode.
  2. Insert Rows for Line Item Detail and enter in budget amounts into the appropriate Hubble ledger column.
  3. Input a description in the Line Item Detail column.
  4. Save the newly inserted row by clicking Save and Continue.
  5. Enter in comments for the Line Item Detail Row.

  1. Click Save and Continue or Finish to exit Enter Budget Mode.

Line Item Detail and Upload to JD Edwards

The budget amount uploaded to JD Edwards is the total consolidated amount for a given account. The Line Item Detail row information is not. This is additional information only available in Hubble Budgeting. When in Upload Preview, you will see the total for the budget amount submitted for all rows for a specific account.

For example, below, Line Item Detail has been utilized to add 6 lines of detail to a single JD Edwards account. The detail totals 100,000.

The upload to the JE Edward’s F0902Z1 batch file will consolidate the detail into a single entry for this account, totaling 100,000.

Line Item Detail and Summary Budgeting

Line Item Detail also is available for input forms that have been defined to allow budget submissions without a Valid Account ID. Consistent with Summary Budgeting, submissions without a Valid Account ID are not uploaded to JD Edwards.

Line Item Budgeting Process on the Web

To add or delete a line item on the web, first follow steps 1 to 4 as described in Add Line Item DetailColumn.

  1. Next, in the Web click on Open Edit Mode. The Line Item Detail column (along with other editable cells) will be highlighted, indicating that it is ready for input.

  1. The data entry toolbar will also be displayed, including the Insert Row button.
    Use this button to add rows for line item detail budgeting.

In the example below, we have added 2 additional rows for Telephone expenses to show the budget amounts:

Summary Budgeting

Summary Budgeting allows you to enter budget amounts at levels other than a valid Account ID, such as at the Company or Business Unit level.

While budgeting amounts can be entered and submitted at a summary level within Hubble, this may cause issues with uploading budgeting amounts to your ERP or comparing summarized budgets to actuals that reside in valid Accounts.

Within Hubble you cannot upload to JD Edwards budget amounts that are at the summary level. If you try to upload summary budget data, you will receive this message: Some rows in the current selection are not suitable for uploading to the ERP. This is because budget amounts without Business Unit, Object Account, and Subsidiary do not have valid Account IDs associated with them.

Important: Use extreme caution in setting the option to Allow Submissions without a valid Account ID. This should usually be turned off. Once it is turned on, it may become difficult to consolidate or roll up accounts. If your business requirements do require it to be on, do not turn it on and off within the same form; leave it checked or unchecked. More information can be found in the Summary Budgeting section.

Enabling Summary Budgeting

Summary Budgeting is enabled on a form by form basis and is enabled while editing a Form via the Forms tab of the Budget Setup dialog. Note, only Budgeting Administrators can edit Input Forms.

To Enable Summary Budget:

  1. Open the Forms tabs.
  2. Select the desired form, click Edit.

  1. Use the checkbox to Allow submissions without a Valid Account.
  2. Click OK to complete the change.

Hierarchies and Summary Budgeting

When budgeting at a summary level, you can use a hierarchy. This is useful when you wish to enter a budget amount for a group of items as defined in a Hierarchy Node. In order to do this, the hierarchy must contain the column(s) for which you wish to budget. If you are budgeting at a Category Code level, for example, you must create a hierarchy to contain the Category Code column. Hierarchy nodes can contain ranges or wildcards (*), which appear as one line when set to Total.

The below example includes a hierarchy with Object Account as the only selected dimension. Ranges of accounts are separated into nodes. The hierarchy contains Label nodes, to separate Total Revenues and Costs of Goods Sold. Under each label are Normal Entry nodes that define a range of object account.

Each normal entry includes multiple object accounts, or range of object accounts, and is set to Total. This will create one line on the report for each Normal Entry.

While in Enter Budget Mode, a contributor can enter one amount to each range of object accounts.

Restrict entry to only the lowest level items of the hierarchy

To allow the contributor to Enter Amounts to both the expanded and detail rows of a hierarchy node. Uncheck the “Restrict Entry to only the lowest items of the hierarchy” checkbox on the Scope tab of the Edit Cycle dialog on the report for each Normal Entry.

In the below example, we set a hierarchy node set to ‘Both Total/Expanded’ this will create one line in the report for each object account included in the listing and range, as well as a single total row.

While in Enter Budget Mode, a contributor can enter one amount to each range of object accounts and the total row.