Financial projections

A financial projection is a plan you enter by hand: a header for a company and fiscal year, plus lines that each hold an expected amount, a probability and the date you expect the cash. Its job is to feed the Cash Flow Forecast. When the forecast's Pipeline option is set to Include weighted pipeline, the forecast adds each line's probability-weighted amount to the month of its expected collection date, on top of the open receivables and payables already in the ledger.

Overview

A projection has two parts:

• The projection (header), kept in Finance Setup → Planning → Financial Projections. It names the company, the fiscal year and the ProjectionType (revenue, expense or cash).
• The projection lines, on the projection's Lines tab. Each line can carry a GL account, an item, a fiscal period, a project, a cost center, a GST registration, three expected dates and the amounts.

Actual figures are never stored on a projection. Every comparison with actuals is made against the posted ledger when a statement is generated.

Two screens have similar names but do different things:

When to use it

Use a projection when you know about cash that is not yet in the ledger. Examples are a contract you expect to sign, a quarterly retainer you have not invoiced yet, or a large planned purchase. Open invoices and bills already appear in the Cash Flow Forecast, so you don't need to project them.

For a plan you want to control spending against, use a budget instead. Budgets and projections are separate records, and neither one reads the other.

How xMatix handles it

Cash Flow Forecast. The forecast shows the months ahead, starting with the current month (the Horizon: 3, 6, 9, 12, 18 or 24 months). It starts from the opening cash and adds expected collections and payments month by month. With Pipeline set to Committed AR/AP only (the default), it reads only open receivables and payables. With Include weighted pipeline, it also reads projection lines:

1. It takes every projection for the forecast's company whose IsActive is ticked or empty. It does not filter on fiscal year, status or scenario.
2. From those projections it takes every line that has an ExpectedCollectionDate. A line with no expected collection date is left out.
3. If you scope the forecast to a branch, business unit or GST registration, it keeps only the lines that carry that same value.
4. For each line it works out the weighted amount: ProjectedNetAmount × Probability Percent ÷ 100. When the probability is empty, it counts as 100%. A line whose weighted amount is zero is left out.
5. It puts the weighted amount in the month of the expected collection date. A date before the first month goes into the first month, and a date after the horizon goes into the last month.
6. If the projection's ProjectionType is Expense (in any capitalisation), the amount is added to Expected Payments (AP). Any other value, including an empty one, adds it to Expected Collections (AR).

The projected amounts appear as a row called Projected pipeline (weighted) under each section. Net Cash Flow and Closing Cash include them.

The Financial Projection statement. Financials → Analysis & Planning → Financial Projection works out a run-rate projection from posted actuals. Each profit and loss account's year-to-date actual is multiplied by the number of periods in the fiscal year divided by the number of periods elapsed. The Layout picker offers Projection vs Actual (columns Projection (FY), Actual (YTD), To Go and % Realized) and Projection only. The platform can also build this statement from a stored projection, but the Finance Statement widget has no setting for choosing one. The standard screens therefore always show the run-rate version.

Prerequisites

• The company has a fiscal year with its periods generated.
• You can open the Finance Setup app and have access to Financial Projection and Financial Projection Line (see Permissions).
• An administrator has made the line form usable (see Configuration). On the standard form, Quick Add can't save a line.
• To read the result, a page shows the Finance Statement widget with Statement set to Cash Flow Forecast (see Configuration).

Procedure

Step 1 — Create the projection

1. Open Finance Setup → Planning → Financial Projections and select New.
2. At the top of the form, pick the Partner Account: the company whose plan this is, not a customer. Pick a Business Unit and Branch if the plan belongs to one.
3. In Period Details, pick the Fiscal Year. Leave IsActive ticked. Type the ProjectionType: Revenue, Expense or CashFlow.
4. Leave Approval Details empty for now.
5. Save.

The projection is numbered automatically in the FP series. Open it from the list. Its record page has two tabs, Lines and Details.

Step 2 — Add the lines

1. On the Lines tab, select Quick Add. A short form opens, and the line is linked to the projection for you.
2. Pick the GL Account the amount belongs to. You can also pick an Item and a Fiscal Period.
3. Save the line. If you get "Name is required", the line form has not been set up yet; see Common problems.
4. Open the line from the list.

Step 3 — Enter the dates and amounts

On the line's record page, the fields edit in place:

1. Under Expected Dates, set ExpectedCollectionDate, the date you expect the money to arrive (or leave, for an expense projection). This is the only date the forecast reads. ExpectedInvoiceDate and ExpectedRevenueDate are for your own reference.
2. Under References, add a Project, Cost Center or GST Registration if they apply.
3. Under Amount Details, enter ProjectedNetAmount, the figure the forecast uses. Enter Probability Percent as a whole number (75 means 75%). ProjectedAmount and ProjectedTaxAmount are for reference only.

Repeat Steps 2 and 3 for each expected receipt or payment.

Step 4 — Read the forecast

1. Open the page that shows the Cash Flow Forecast.
2. Pick the Fiscal year and Horizon. Set Pipeline to Include weighted pipeline.
3. Under Expected Collections (AR) or Expected Payments (AP), find the Projected pipeline (weighted) row. Each line's weighted amount appears in the month of its expected collection date.

Step 5 — Revise or retire a projection

• Change a line. Open the line and edit the amount, probability or date in place. The forecast picks up the change the next time it is generated.
• Record sign-off. On the projection, select Edit and fill in Approved On and Approved By. These fields are a record only. Nothing locks or enables the projection because of them.
• Take a projection out of the forecast. On the projection, clear IsActive. Its lines then no longer count.
• Remove it. Select Delete on the projection, or on a line from the Lines tab row menu.

Fields

Financial Projection

The record also has Label, Period From, Period To, ScenarioType, Status and VersionNo. These are not on the standard forms, and nothing reads them. Period From, Period To and Status appear as columns on the list.

Financial Projection Line

The record page's header strip shows the line's Partner Account, Business Unit and Branch. A line also has Party Account (the customer or supplier), WeightedAmount, ReferenceType, ReferenceId, Status and Remarks, which are not on the standard line forms. If WeightedAmount has a value (for example from an import), the forecast uses it instead of net × probability.

Business rules

• Numbering. A projection is numbered from the FP series when it is saved. Lines have no numbering setting, so they need a typed Name.
• What reaches the forecast. Only lines of active projections for the forecast's company that have an expected collection date and a non-zero weighted amount reach the forecast.
• Weighting. The weighted amount is the stored WeightedAmount if there is one. Otherwise it is ProjectedNetAmount × Probability Percent ÷ 100, with an empty probability counting as 100.
• No de-duplication. Every active projection for the company adds to the forecast. If a base plan and an optimistic plan are both active, both are counted. Keep only one version active at a time.
• Dimension scope. When the forecast is scoped by branch, business unit or GST registration, a line counts only if it carries the same value. A line with an empty dimension is left out of a scoped forecast.
• No posting. A projection never creates a journal and never changes a ledger balance.
• Status and approval. Nothing changes or checks a projection's status or approval fields.

Example

A distribution company expects a new wholesale contract to start in December. It also plans to buy a delivery van in January.

1. The finance controller creates projection FP-… for the company and fiscal year 2026-27, with ProjectionType Revenue. They add a line for GL account Sales — Wholesale, open it, and set ProjectedNetAmount 4,00,000, Probability Percent 60 and ExpectedCollectionDate 15 January.
2. They create a second projection with ProjectionType Expense. They add a line for GL account Vehicles, with ProjectedNetAmount 9,50,000, Probability Percent 100 and ExpectedCollectionDate 20 January.
3. In November they open the Cash Flow Forecast with a 6-month horizon and Include weighted pipeline. The January column now shows 2,40,000 (60% of 4,00,000) in Projected pipeline (weighted) under Expected Collections, and 9,50,000 under Expected Payments. January's Closing Cash falls by the difference, 7,10,000.
4. In December the contract is signed, so they raise the probability to 100. The January collection becomes 4,00,000.
5. Once the January invoice is posted, its open receivable appears in the forecast as a committed item. The controller clears IsActive on the revenue projection so the amount is not counted twice.

Training

Practice exercise

In a sandbox company with a fiscal year:

1. Create a projection with ProjectionType Revenue, and add one line with ProjectedNetAmount 1,00,000, Probability Percent 50 and an ExpectedCollectionDate two months from today.
2. Open the Cash Flow Forecast with Include weighted pipeline.

Expected result: a Projected pipeline (weighted) row under Expected Collections shows 50,000 in the month of the date, and Closing Cash for that month and every later month is 50,000 higher than with Committed AR/AP only. Then change the projection's ProjectionType to Expense. The 50,000 moves to Expected Payments, and Closing Cash is 50,000 lower than with Committed AR/AP only.

Quick reference

• Projections are in Finance Setup → Planning → Financial Projections.
• Only lines with an ExpectedCollectionDate reach the forecast.
• Weighted amount = ProjectedNetAmount × Probability Percent ÷ 100. An empty probability counts as 100.
• ProjectionType Expense adds to payments, and anything else adds to collections.
• Every active projection for the company counts, so keep one version active.
• Clear IsActive once the real invoice or bill is in the ledger.
• The Financial Projection statement is a run-rate view of actuals and does not read your projections.
• A projection never posts to the ledger.

Permissions

The standard security profiles give full access to Financial Projection and Financial Projection Line: view, create, edit and delete. Creating, editing and deleting are controlled by the profile's entity access, so a user whose profile lacks that access can't use New, Quick Add, Edit or Delete. The Cash Flow Forecast and Projected Income Statement are fiscal-year server actions, so a user needs the matching grant on the profile's Actions tab to generate them. The standard profiles have both grants. Profiles are managed in Security profiles.

Configuration

• Make lines savable. The standard Financial Projection Line create form has no Name field, and lines have no numbering setting, so Quick Add is refused with "Name is required". Fix either one:
  • In Design Studio, add Name to the line's create layout (see Design a form layout). Add ProjectedNetAmount, Probability Percent and ExpectedCollectionDate at the same time, so users can enter everything in one step.
  • Or add a document numbering setting for Financial Projection Line under Design Studio → Entities → Financial Projection Line → Logic → Document Settings.
• Scope the Lines tab. On the standard Financial Projection record page, the Lines list has no relation set, so it lists the lines of every projection. In the designer, set the list's relation to Financial Projection Lines so each projection shows only its own lines.
• Show the Cash Flow Forecast. No standard page shows the Cash Flow Forecast. Add a Finance Statement widget to an app page and set its Statement to Cash Flow Forecast. Users then choose the Horizon and Pipeline on the page.
• Expose more fields. Party Account, ScenarioType, Period From, Period To and WeightedAmount can be added to the forms in the designer. Only WeightedAmount changes the forecast.
• Numbering. The projection's FP series is the Financial Projection Settings document setting. Change its prefix or length under Design Studio → Entities → Financial Projection → Logic → Document Settings.

Common problems

"Name is required" when I add a line

The line form has no Name field and lines are not numbered automatically. An administrator adds Name to the line create layout, or adds a numbering setting (see Configuration).

My projection doesn't show in the Cash Flow Forecast

Work through these checks:

• Pipeline must be set to Include weighted pipeline.
• Each line needs an ExpectedCollectionDate.
• The projection's IsActive must be ticked.
• The projection's Partner Account must be the company the forecast is run for.
• ProjectedNetAmount and Probability Percent must not be zero.
• If the forecast is scoped to a branch, business unit or GST registration, the line must carry the same value.

The pipeline amount is counted twice

Two active projections cover the same plan, such as a base version and a revised one. Clear IsActive on the one you no longer use. Also check whether the real invoice or bill is already in the ledger. If it is, it is counted as a committed item as well as a projected one.

The Lines tab shows lines from other projections

The standard layout's Lines list is not scoped to the projection. Look at each line's Financial Projection column, or ask an administrator to set the list's relation (see Configuration).

The Financial Projection statement ignores my projection

That statement is a run-rate projection from posted actuals, and the standard screens can't point it at a stored projection. Use the Cash Flow Forecast to see your projections.

Common questions

Does a projection affect the ledger or the statements?

No. A projection is a planning record only. It never creates a journal, so the profit and loss, balance sheet, trial balance and every other ledger statement are unchanged. The only standard place a projection shows up is the Cash Flow Forecast, and only when its Pipeline option is set to Include weighted pipeline. Even there, the projected amounts are kept in their own Projected pipeline (weighted) row, so you can always see how much of the forecast is committed and how much is planned.

Should I enter amounts as negative for payments?

No. Enter positive amounts. The projection's ProjectionType decides the direction: Expense adds the weighted amounts to Expected Payments, and any other type adds them to Expected Collections. A negative amount would reduce the section it lands in rather than move the money to the other side. If one plan has both receipts and payments, use two projections, one of each type.

How do I keep scenarios such as base and optimistic?

Create one projection per scenario. The ScenarioType field exists but is not on the standard forms and is not read by the forecast. Because the forecast adds up every active projection for the company, tick IsActive on only the scenario you want to see and clear it on the others. To compare two scenarios, switch which one is active and generate the forecast again.

What is the difference between a projection and a budget?

A budget is a plan per GL account that the Budget vs Actual statement compares with posted actuals. A projection is a set of dated, probability-weighted expected amounts that feeds the Cash Flow Forecast. The two are separate records: a budget does not appear in the cash forecast, and a projection does not appear in Budget vs Actual.

Related topics

• Financial statements — every statement screen, including the run-rate Financial Projection statement.
• Budgets and budget control
• AR and AP subledgers — the open items the forecast treats as committed.
• Fiscal years and periods
• Business units
• Financial Projection reference and Financial Projection Line reference