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Financial Documents Used for Decisions

Of the myriad of reports that Clients and Profits produces, which do you find the most helpful in making decisions regarding the financial state of your agencies. Or in some cases, which documents do you provide to the decision-makers or principals of your respective agencies? Thank you for your feedback.

Joey Pless Controller Nerve, Inc.

I provide only the Income Statement and the Balance Sheet to the owners. I look at Client P&L reports as well

Lynnette Kokomoor

We use the Billable/Unbillable Time Summary to measure productivity, the Client Job Summary inclusive of all open jobs to measure WIP, and run a trial balance about every other day to see how we are doing month- and year-to-date allowing for WIP adjustments and figuring in remaining payroll and other expenses for the month. We also track month-to-date billings vs. our break-even figure to gauge our overall performance. Hope that helps.

Terry L. Jones, Jr. Controller Harvey and Daughters, Inc.

I use the cash flash to give to our principal with the checks for her to sign. Other than that, she gets an Income Statement every month. I print an Income Statement, Trial Balance and Balance Sheet every month for myself and our accountant.

Catherine Colangelo Business Manager The Phillips Agency

I put together a comprehensive package that I forward to our accounting firm and our agency management each month. Following is a list of what I include: General Journal A/R at month end A/P at month end Bank Reconciliation Trial Balance Balance Sheet Income Statement Comparative Balance Sheet Comparative Income Statement Budget vs Actual Comparative Budget vs Actual Client Time By Staff Report Gross Margin Reports Staff Utilization Report --- And I compute manually a client by client yield report which shows profitability by client. --- This compilation of reports gives answers to almost any question imaginable. I type a cover sheet highlighting key areas from the month.

Lane Newsome

We use the income statement and balancesheet as well as the client P&Ls and Gross Margin by Client report under client profitability. The problem with these last two reports is that to have your Client P&Ls come out correctly you have to do a general journal entry for the work in process at least by client - I do it by Job and Client (Debiting Jobcost and Crediting WIP). This is a long general journal entry. We bill for media before we receive the vendor invoices so we have to accrue for the Media cost. We also accrue for any major costs for any production that we have not received the vendor invoice on. This creates a problem with the Gross Margin by Client report because it only reflects costs that have been posted to a job. When you accrue through a general journal entry you can tie it to a client p&l but you can't to the Gross Margin by Client. I compare the reports as a double check that the monthly WIP entry I make is correct. With such a long entry mistakes will happen. I also have a spreadsheet that I update monthly listing Gross Margin by Client. Knowing where your income is coming from and who is generating it (AE) is very important. I hope this helps.

Brian Woolard Chief Financial Officer O'Brien et al. Advertising

I agree with your comments about the Client P&L's and the extra entries required. My method has been to prepare month end entries and have them auto-reverse the next month so that all I have to do is prepare the next month's ending entries each time. Have you found a method that is quicker than this? I have also found an extra step is required when you enter a/c payable and the "invoice" such as a credit card bill which has both overhead and job costs on it. Putting NONE on the job field for the overhead expenses causes those expenses to be charged against the last client/job we have in alphabetical order on the Client P&L's. This can be deleted so that its not allocated to any client, but its a pain to do it. Has any one else had this problem?

Cheri at Wilson Chapman

We always use the hybrid option "job cost/overhead". I suggest call C & P asking them, why is that happening in your system. Good luck!

A. Tebbetts Controller Blu Orbit International

I have called C&P and they couldn't explain. But also, I've never heard of the hybrid option you mentioned. Is this something new in a recent update or upgrade? C&P didn't mention it as a solution when I called them. Thanks,

Cheri

I believe she may be referring to Client P&L Analysis under Snapshots > Financials > Income Statement. This report allocates overhead per client. I was not able to reproduce your problem where you said posting an A/P invoice with job costs and overhead amounts will add the client code for the previous job entered in the A/P cost distribution. Make sure you tab from field to field, esp. tabbing off job NONE in the overhead lines. Tabbing often sets values in memory to copy into a saved record. Tabbing off job NONE should ensure no job or client is saved into the overhead A/P line item.

Kent Richardson C&P List Server Administrator

Perhaps your tech can check the data, and see if it's corrupted or anything else regarding set-up... As per the "Hybrid option" I call that, to the Job Cost invoice option, which allows to enter an accounts payable invoice for both a job cost and an overhead expense. Go to A/P - Edit - Job Cost - click on the box for distribute to Many Jobs, Tasks - enter Job number or "none" under JOB #. This option should not allocate your overhead costs to any job number, if that happens you know there is something wrong with C & P. We use C & P version 4.05.

Anita Tebbetts Controller Blu Orbit International

Lane, How? What reports, etc do you use to "compute manually a client by client yield report which shows profitability by client?" I will be forever grateful! Thanks!

Sandy Husk