The interface in Sage 50 (formerly Peachtree, originated by Peachtree Software based in Atlanta, Ga) for modifying financial statements is not pretty, it doesn’t have colors swirling around, it doesn’t have the soft, plastic feel that so many things do these days.
But it works very well, and it is easy to use.
Basic steps:
Click on ‘Design’ in the top menu bar (it has a color palette as the icon image), and that opens a screen with the format design ready to be modified.
On the left side of each line of the format definition is a description of what kind of line that line is:
Text – Body – Header lines (above groupings of accounts), space between sections
Line Description – content lines with account numbers, descriptions, and dollar amounts
Total – includes the level of that section, with the smallest number being the section total, and then the totals including more sections are set to higher total level. I’ll expand on this in the future.
In order to break one section of the report into more detail sections, you can add text body lines, then add the line description and specify the account numbers for that section. Then add the total, with the correct level. Then adjust the account numbers in the line description of the original section to be the correct subset, and modify the total level if needed. Save the report with a descriptive name.
In particular, you can copy (right click for menu, or using keyboard shortcuts) the type of line that you want in your new section from an existing section, then position your cursor on the line below where you want your new line, and paste.
In the header line property window, it will default to center alignment, you probably want to change that to left alignment.
In the account number property window, you can type in the beginning account number and ending account number, or you can use the lookup feature to select those beginning and ending account numbers, or you can use the section below that which lets you indicate type of account for that section of the report. The description for each account line will be the text in your chart of accounts. You have a choice of how each set of accounts is presented: Detail, Rollup, Summary, or ‘No’. I’ll talk more about that in a later posting.
The ‘Preview’ icon in the top bar lets you see the effect of your changes, then you can click ‘Design’ to return.
The ongoing challenge, once you start selecting the account numbers for each section in this kind of customized report is that there is the danger of adding a new account in to your chart of accounts, and forgetting to also add it in to your financial statement. For this reason, once you start to use customized reports, it’s always good to also run a vanilla, un-customized report as part of your review process to identify any amounts/accounts missed right away.
Nonprofit board members on the Finance Committee could consider asking for income statements in unmodified format in some situations, to compare as well.
Report groups are also available for more efficient month-end processing. Sage 50 financial reports export to Excel well, and also provide drill-down capabilities.
Efficient and effective! (Hmm, this is a bit long.. perhaps I’ll split in to multiple at some point, making this an introductory posting and moving the details to a later posting. Preferences?)
Clarity Solutions 