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BUDGET_PERIODS Table

Explanation
Contains information on when budget periods begin and end for sponsored projects funds. Records are available for up to five budget periods per fund. Indicators are also available for the current budget period, and for the budget period sequence (both in chronological order and in reverse chronological order).

Common Uses
Used in conjunction with the Balances table for "grant year" reporting for sponsored projects funds. (A budget period is often called a "grant year," but it may be a year, less than a year, or more than a year.) For example, "Show me the actual month balances for this fund for the current budget period."

BUDGET_PERIOD_BEGIN_DATE

FUND_CODE



     

BUDGET_PERIOD_BEGIN_DATE

BUDGET_PERIOD_CHRON_SEQ

BUDGET_PERIOD_REV_CHRON_SEQ

CALENDAR_YEAR_BEGIN

CALENDAR_YEAR_END

FISCAL_YEAR_BEGIN

FISCAL_YEAR_END

FUND_CODE

BALANCES

FUND_SPONSOR_CODE

GL_FULL_OLD_TO_NEW

GL_PART_OLD_TO_NEW

PARENT_FUND_CODES

SUMMARY_BALANCES

Cautions

• When selecting a particular budget period, be sure to use the data element that meets your needs. For the earliest budget period, the value for Budget_Period_Chron_Seq will be 1. For the latest budget period, the value for Budget_Period_Rev_Chron_Seq will be 1. For the budget period currently in effect,the value for Current_Period_Flag will be Y. Note that if the value for Budget_Period_Rev_Chron_Seq is 1, it does not necessarily mean that the budget period is current--it might have already ended, or it might not have begun yet.
• A budget period is a discrete period of time for which a fund sponsor has committed funds that can be expended by the University for an agreed upon purpose. This period is defined by the fund sponsor and is communicated in the Notice of Award. The period is usually one year, but may be for any amount of time, and is usually not the same as the University's fiscal year (that runs from July through June). If funding is provided to the University based on specific milestones rather than a specified period of funding, the budget period will be the entire length of time committed to by the fund sponsor, from the Contract_Start_Date through the Project_End_Date. (This is normally the case for clinical trial contracts.)
• A budget period cannot overlap with other budget periods associated with the same fund.
• The value of the Budget_Period_End_Date may change over time. BEN Financials only retains 5 budget periods. The start date of the first (earliest) period should always be the same as the account start date for the fund. As a project enters periods beyond the fifth, the second is appended to the first, the third assumes the place of the second, the fourth that of the third, the fifth that of the fourth and the current (new) period becomes the fifth. For example, at the end of a seven-year award, the earliest budget period would actually encompass the first three years.
• Budget periods for non-government sponsored research may also be changed to facilitate reporting and the management of funds given the mutual agreement of Research Services and the school or center responsible for the fund.
• If the fund sponsor grants a no cost extension or a funded extension, the current budget end date, account end date, and budget period end date will be changed to reflect the extension.
• However, the budget period end date remains unchanged if the fund sponsor grants supplemental funding for an existing budget period (that is, the sponsor grants more money but not more time). And if the fund sponsor grants a non-competing renewal, a new budget period is created.
• Budget period lengths may vary within one fund and amongst funds, as the period might be based on an external reporting requirement (usually indicated on the Notice of Award), an internal reporting requirement, or some other requirement (such as appending to the first period, as described above). Also, the length of a given budget period for a given fund may vary over time, as periods are appended to the earliest budget period, as reporting needs change, etc.
• A budget period may begin and end mid-month. For a fund with two budget periods--the first ending mid-month, the second beginning mid-month--the beginning month for the second period is set to the following month, to avoid double counting balances. For example, if budget period 1 ends September 14, 1997 and budget period 2 begins September 15, 1997, the beginning month for the second period is set to October, 1997, to avoid double counting balances for September, 1997. Note that this means that some activity for the second budget period will be reported as occurring during the first budget period, and that the budget for the second budget period should be posted to its calculated begin month, not to the month in the budget period begin date.
• The budget period begin month is set to the month following the end month for the previous budget period, even if it makes the budget period appear longer than it is. For example, in the unlikely event that a sponsor first funds a project for Jan. 1, 1996 through June 30, 1996, and then renews funding for Jan. 1, 1997 through June 30, 1997, the budget period begin month for budget period 2 will be calculated as July, 1996. That is, the Calendar_Year_Begin would be 1996, and the Calendar_Month_Begin would be 07. The Fiscal_Year_Begin would be 1997, and the Fiscal_Month_Seq_Begin would be 01.
• Budget period end dates are assigned only to funds that were active on February 1, 1998 or thereafter. Any fund that was active on the General Ledger conversion date of June 30, 1996 has special constraints in assigning budget period end dates. This is documented on the website: http://www.umis.upenn.edu/cornerstone/reports/guide3.html#contract in section 3.1.2, Budget Period Dates.

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