The Financial Preferences screen enables you to set up global defaults to use for the active client's financial statements. These settings govern the appearance and content of the financial statements you print for the client and are saved for use in all your reports, but can be changed whenever necessary.
The Financial Preferences screen provides four tabs, each of which provides a number of related options:
§ General Options: The options available from this tab determine the appearance and organization of financial statements and set options related to rounding. In addition, specific options for Balance Sheets and Income Statements govern the information that is included on those statements.
§ Title and Footer: From this tab you can create titles and footers for Balance Sheets, Income Statements, Statements of Cash Flows and Retained Earnings statements.
§ Class Description: You can use the options on this tab to enter or edit any listed class description to print as a heading on Balance Sheets and Income Statements. Changes made to class descriptions on this tab are also reflected on the Chart of Accounts screen. The options on this tab are particularly useful when using the three Miscellaneous classes provided for expense accounts (for example, for a client whose industry requires specialized types of expenses for managerial reporting).
§ Financial Fonts: Using the options available on this tab, you can select a font, font size, a style for the indicated text, and a color for each item listed. Settings apply globally to all your financial statements. Text colors appear on screen and appear in documents printed on color printers.
Note: We recommend that you run a test of your financial statement after you have set preferences on the Financial Preferences screen to ensure you are satisfied with any changes as they appear on a complete report.
You can create a complete financial format using one client, and copy that format, including preferences, to any other client.
To set financial statement preferences:
1. Select Preferences from the Financials menu to open the Financial Preferences screen.
The General Options tab is selected by default.
2. Click the checkboxes in the General Options section of the General Options tab to enable any of the available options.
You can select any of the following options:
§ Print Lines Below Headers and Print Lines Above Footers: These options print decorative horizontal lines below the header or above the footer of each report.
§ Separate Columns for Totals: For single-period reports, this option displays a separate, indented column for subtotals and totals.
§ Separate Pages for Multiple Supporting Schedules: This option starts data for each account class on a new page when you print supporting schedules.
§ Show Firm Logo on Accountant's Report: This option prints any company logo you updated on your financial statements.
§ Capitalize First Letter of Class Descriptions and Capitalize All Letters of Class Descriptions: By default, class and income statement descriptions are printed in upper case for the first word of each phrase. Select either of these options to use only initial capital letters or to use all capital letters.
§ Combine Subaccounts or List Subaccounts: Select one of these options to specify how subaccounts should appear on financial statements.
3. Select the Round Amounts to Whole Dollars option to compensate for minor rounding errors if you are reporting in whole dollars, and select a rounding account from the drop-down lists for each type of statement.
4. Use the available options in the Display Client and/or DBA Name field drop-down list (if available) to specify how to display the client name on financial statements, and enter a description for the Equity section of the Balance Sheet in the Equity Description field.
The Display Client and/or DBA Name field does not appear if the client record does not reflect a DBA name.
5. Click the checkboxes available in the Balance Sheet Options panel to specify the following:
§ Show Retained Earnings Statement as Part of Balance Sheet: Enable this option to display the changes to retained earnings during the period (beginning RE + net income - draw or distributions = ending RE) on the Balance Sheet. Multiple draw, distribution, contribution, and retained earnings accounts are always listed on the Balance Sheet (you can combine each class to show them as a single line using the options available on the Formatting screen). If you do not select this option, only the ending RE balance is shown.
Non-profit organizations must select this option to ensure that the Unrestricted Net Assets, Temporarily Restricted Net Assets, and Permanently Restricted Net Assets funds are displayed separately on the Balance Sheet.
Note: Typically, partnerships do not enable this option, and print the separate Statement of Partners' Capital.
§ Show Percent of Assets: Select this option to display a percentage column on single-period Balance Sheets. Each line is computed as a percentage of total assets.
§ Separate Liability and Capital Totals: Enable this option to print separate totals and headers for the liabilities and equities sections of the balance sheet. If you do not select this option, a grand total prints for both sections, and the heading is combined into a single line (for example, Liabilities and Equity).
§ Page Break Before Liabilities: Select this option to insert a page break before the Liabilities section.
§ Show Variance on Comparative Statement: Enable this option to include a variance column on reports for a single prior year.
6. Click the appropriate checkboxes to enable any of the following options on the Income Statement Options panel:
§ Show Retained Earnings on Income Statement: Enable this option to display beginning and ending retained earnings on Income Statements. If you do not select this option, you can select the Show Retained Earnings as Part of Balance Sheet in the Balance Sheet Options panel, or you can print a separate Statement of Retained Earnings or Partners' Capital.
§ Show Percent of Sales: Select this option to display a percentage column on single-period Income Statements. Each line is computed as a percentage of total sales.
§ Page Break Before Expenses: Select this option to insert a page break before the Expenses section.
§ Show Variance on Comparative Statement: Enable this option to include a variance column on reports for a single prior year.
7. Use the Section Descriptions panel to enter the names to give to the listed sections.
8. Click the Title and Footer tab and enter text in the appropriate fields in the Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Statement of Cash Flows, and Retained Earnings columns to set one- or two-line titles and footers for specific financial statements.
The fields reflect default text, but can be edited as needed.
9. Click the Class Description tab to edit any of the listed class descriptions in the Balance Sheet or Income Statement columns to print customized descriptions as headings on Balance Sheets and Income Statements.
Note: Changes to class descriptions are also reflected on the Chart of Accounts screen.
To edit the existing descriptions, replace the text in the appropriate field.
10. Use the Print Order column on the Class Description tab to specify the order in which to print classes on the Income Statement.
11. Select the Financial Fonts tab to access options that allow you to customize the appearance of specific text that appears in financial statements.
The first column identifies the text to be customized. You can customize the text used for the Client Name, Report Name, and Period, the text used in the Header, for Details, and in the Footer.
12. Use the drop-down lists in the Name, Size, and Color columns to select the font, font size, and font color for each specific type of text, and click the check boxes in the Bold and Italic columns to apply those text styles to each type of text. You can click View to preview the results each time you make a change.
Settings apply globally to all financial statements for the active client.
You can click the Restore Defaults button to reverse any changes you made and restore the original settings
13. Click the Make Negatives Red option to print all negative amounts in red text.
14. Click Save to save your selections.
We recommend that you click Save each time you finish setting options on a tab.