Budget Comparison

Movie Magic Budgeting allows you to compare up to 4 budgets to each other to see differences and trends across accounts and categories. You can directly compare Categories and Accounts that have matching Account Numbers. If you want to compare Details across multiple budgets, try using the Split Screen mode.

Start a Comparison

• Open the primary budget for the comparison
  • This is usually the most recent copy/version, or the "parent" budget if comparing to sub-budgets
• Click the Compare button in the top right of the main budget window
• Click the Link option next to each budget you want compared to your primary budget
  • You can use the Search field to find budgets anywhere in your library
  • You can link up to 3 other budgets to your primary budget
• Click outside the Compare menu to close it and review your comparison

Comparison Navigation

The Topsheet and Category levels of the primary budget will be temporarily replaced with the Comparison view. Each of the "linked" budgets will be designated by a letter that is listed next to the budget name in the Compare menu.

Note: Cut, Copy, Paste, Insert, and Delete at the Topsheet or Category level are unavailable when doing a comparison.

If you navigate to the Account Detail level you will only be seeing or acting on the details for the original (primary) budget. If you make changes to the detail lines of your primary budget this will change the reported amounts in the Comparison.

Comparison Columns

On the Topsheet and Category views your columns will now include:

Column	Description
Total (A, B, or C)	The total value for that category or account for each of the linked budgets selected above
Total (A + B + C)	A sum of all the totals across all the linked budgets selected above
Avg (A, B, C)	The average of all the totals across all the linked budgets selected above
Total (this)	The total value for that category or account for the primary budget originally selected above
Var	The variance of the Total (A + B + C) minus the Total (this)
%	The % of the variance as compared to the Total (this)

Note: The Original and Agg Fringe columns can be added to the table, but are only relevant to the primary budget that was opened (e.g. the budget reported in Total(this)).

Closing a Comparison

• With a comparison open...
• Click the Compare button in the top right of the main budget window
• Click to Unlink all of the budgets that have been linked for comparison
• Once all budgets have been unlinked, click outside the Compare menu to close it

The original (primary) budget is now visible and editable as normal.

Comparison Report

• With a comparison open...
• Click Reports Setup
• Select Comparison Reports

The system presents a preview of the Comparison report. In general this works the same as when generating a Budget Report.

The Included Sections button will control if the Comparison Topsheet or Comparison Accounts pages are included.