Reference Guide

Comprehensive documentation for Spendlab, the visual budgeting tool for the grant-funded community.

Contents

• What's New
• Basics
• Groups & Rows
• Funding Sources
• People
• Expenses
• Indirect Costs
• Definitions
• Export Data
• Shortcuts
• Privacy

What's New

Click here to learn about the latest updates.

Basics

Get started with Spendlab.

• Create a new, blank file by clicking in the toolbar at the top of the page.
Name your file at the top of the page.
• Save your budget as a file by clicking in the toolbar. This will download your budget directly to your computer as a ".htm" file. You can store and/or share the file, like you would with any other file type.
• Open a saved file by clicking in the toolbar, or by dragging and dropping the budget file directly into the Spendlab window. (Double-clicking a file will open Spendlab in a new browser window. You can then drag and drop the budget file into that window.)
• Adjust the visible time range using the controls near the top of the page. You can:
  • Drag either side of the bar.
  • Directly enter the start and end dates.
  • Enter the time duration (in years).

  To the right of the bar, you can also set the time step for your budget. Blocks will snap to either month or half-month boundaries when creating grants and adding expenses.

• Choose a currency symbol using the menu near the top-right of the page.
  This will be the currency shown for all financial values in the budget. (This affects formatting only. Spendlab does not track conversion rates nor attempt to convert between international currencies.)
• Examine a summary of all funding sources by toggling the caret icon next to the section labeled Overview at the top of the page.
• Access reference materials by clicking at the top-right corner of the page or Help at the bottom of the page.

Groups & Rows

Spendlab’s interface uses several rows of graphs/trendlines to provide an intuitive budgeting experience. Rows are organized into groups for Funding Sources, People, etc.

• Rename a group by clicking on the heading above each group of rows.

• Add a row by clicking on the + icon at the bottom of any group.

  Rename a row by directly clicking on the bold heading of the row itself.

• Attach an inline note by right-clicking anywhere on a timeline and choosing Attach a note. Notes are visible to anyone who opens the file.
• Add a note to a group or row header by clicking on the document icon that appears when hovering over either. For groups, the note icon will appear next to the group’s name. For rows (with the exception of the rows in the People section), the icon will appear at the bottom of the row.
• Collapse and expand groups or rows by toggling the carets next to their names (hovering over a row will reveal its caret).
• Reorder rows by dragging the colored/gray side columns on the left-hand side of the screen. You can rearrange rows however you want within each group.
• Adjust the visible time range of a row by clicking on the left and right carets below the y-axis of each row or by dragging the icon.
• Pin a row to the top of the screen by clicking on the pin icon at the bottom of the colored/gray side columns. It will appear when you hover your mouse over the column. Click it again to unpin the row.
• Delete a row by clicking on the x at the top-right of the row.

Funding Sources

Keep track of your startup funds, grants, donations, and other funding sources with color-coded blocks and trendlines.

• Set the current actual balance for each funding source by clicking on the dollar value under Actual balance and entering a new value.
• Add a funding installment by double-clicking along the row’s timeline. This will create a block that increases the balance. It can be moved by clicking and dragging.
• Edit the value of a block by clicking on the value above the block and entering a new value, or by vertically dragging the top edge of each block.
• Delete a block by right-clicking the block and choosing Delete block, or by clicking on the block and pressing your keyboard’s delete key.
• See projected balances by hovering your mouse over any point in time. The balance for each time step is calculated by adding any funding installments and subtracting all expenses listed in the budget file.
• Insert follow-up actual balances to keep your Spendlab file up to date with your accounting system as time passes. Right-click on the timeline at the date of your most recent financial report and choose Set actual balance on.... (Or simply double-click the balance line at the desired date.) Then enter the actual balance remaining in the account.

  The most recent actual balance in the funding source row is used as the basis for future projected balances and projected-vs-actual comparisons.

• Compare projected vs. actual by moving the cursor over an actual balance point. This will show exactly how much the expenses in your budget file over- or under-estimated your actual expenses during the time span since the previous actual balance point.

  If you edit the historical expenses in your file, the historical projection will change accordingly and the difference comparison will be recalculated.

• Triangle indicators show the approximate magnitude of the difference between the projected and actual balance.

  The exact formula may change in the future (let us know if you have suggestions!) — but the current thresholds are:

  • Hollow triangle: difference less than $1,000
  • One triangle: difference greater than $1,000
  • Two triangles: difference greater than $5,000
  • Three triangles: difference greater than $10,000

• Remove an actual balance by right-clicking on the balance and choosing Remove actual balance. However, in most cases, it's best to keep your historical actual balances in the file for reference purposes.
• Set the indirect rate for a funding source by editing the percentage next to the corresponding label on the left-side panel of the row. If you don't want to track indirect expenses, you can leave this value at 0%. (Note: Learn more about how Indirect Rates work with Spendlab.)
• Change the carry-over behavior for a funding source using the corresponding menu on the left-side panel of the row.
  • Carry over remaining balances: Remaining balances are always carried forward until the final end date of the funding source.
  • Reset balance each funding period: The remaining balance is reset to $0 at the start of each funding block on the timeline.
• Set the end date of each funding source by clicking on the End date tag at the end of each row and typing in the appropriate date (Note: most date formats will work, including mm/dd/yyyy, mm/dd/yy, or *month name* *day*,*year*). You can also set the end date by dragging the bar on the right edge of the row.

People

Manage how everyone in the lab is being paid.

• Indicate a person is working by double-clicking or dragging anywhere on the timeline. This results in blocks that are labeled by a percentage (rather than a monetary value). These blocks can be edited and dragged at any time.
  By default, the funding source is "unassigned," but can be specified later.
• Assign funding sources for a person by selecting their block(s) and clicking on the resulting menu next to the block. You may choose any available funding source.
• Split a person’s payment across multiple funding sources by selecting a block on their row and clicking the icon under the funding source menu on the right-hand side of the block. You can add as many splits as you like. Change the percentage assigned to each split by directly clicking and editing the percent value or by dragging the middle dividers in the block.
• Specify part-time work by clicking and editing the percentage label on a person's block, or by vertically dragging the top of the block. For example, 100% means full-time and 50% means half-time.
• Set a person’s salary by clicking and inputting its value into the corresponding field on the left-side panel of the row. This is the full-time equivalent salary, so if a person is split across funding sources or working part-time, the actual salary cost will be reduced according to the percent effort.
• Adjust the salary unit by setting it to per month (default), per quarter, per year, or per hour. These are simply shortcuts so that you don't have to manually calculate the value per month.

  For example, if a person’s yearly salary is $60,000, selecting per year means that each month in a block represents $5,000. (Even if you don’t drag the blocks across the entire year, each block will still be worth $5,000.)

  Adjusting the salary unit does not automatically create a yearly, monthly, or quarterly repeat. You need to create blocks manually to span the duration that the person is working.

• Set a fringe rate (also known as "fringe benefit rate") by clicking and inputting its percent value into the corresponding field on the left-side panel of the row. A person’s salary does not include the fringe rate. Rather, fringe rate is added on top of it, and is calculated by multiplying the rate by the salary. For example, a person with a monthly salary of $1000 and a fringe rate of 20% results in a $1000 + ($1000 × 20%) = $1200 expense for each month.
• Set additional costs such as tuition (that are not already included in the salary or fringe rate) by choosing a definition for Other on the left-side panel of the row.

  Unlike salary and fringe costs, "Other" costs are billed at 100% even when a block uses less than 100% total effort. This is because every group we talked to said they were responsible for covering either all or none of the tuition for part-time students.

  For example, the following two blocks charge different amounts to the orange NSF grant:

  The first block models a part-time student who is fully funded by the grant. The grant pays 50% of the specified salary and fringe costs, and 100% of the tuition.

  The second block models a full-time student who is 50% funded by the grant. The grant pays 50% of the specified salary, fringe, and tuition.

• Learn about added customizability by referring to Indirect Costs and Definitions.

Expenses

The Supplies, Equipment, Travel, and Other groups all function in the same way to provide a consistent way to plan your budget.

• Add expenses by double-clicking or dragging across a timeline to create blocks (double clicking defaults the payment to one time, while dragging creates a repeating, per-month, expense).
• Edit an expense by directly clicking and editing its value or by vertically dragging the top of the block.
• Split an expense payment across multiple funding sources by selecting their block(s) and clicking the icon under the funding source menu on the right-hand side of the block. You can add as many splits as you like. Change the percentage assigned to each split by directly clicking and editing the percent value or by dragging the middle dividers in the block.

Indirect Costs

Optionally integrate indirect rates — also known as overhead rates, central office rates, or facilities and administrative (F&A) rates — into your budget.

• To use indirect rates, start by setting an indirect rate for at least one funding source.

  If you don't want Spendlab to automatically add indirect costs (whether because the funding source doesn't provide them or you just don't want to see them), simply use the default 0% indirect rate.

• Specify that an expense is subject to indirect costs by choosing Add indirects below the expense’s name. (In most cases, this is selected by default.) Spendlab will then automatically add indirect costs for any funding sources used on the row that have a non-zero indirect rate. (For funding sources with a 0% indirect rate, the indirect costs are always $0, so "Add indirects" has no effect.)

  The monetary amount shown on expense blocks always represents the direct cost ($1000 in the example above). Automatic indirect costs are represented by a checkerboard pattern above the block. The total cost (direct + indirect) is deducted from funding source balances.

  For example, consider a supply row with a yearly expense of $50,000 paid from a funding source with a starting balance of $100,000 and indirect rate of 50%.

  Indirect costs are $50,000 × 50% = $25,000, so the total is $50,000 + $25,000 = $75,000. Therefore, since the starting balance was $100,000, the balance after a year will be $100,000 - $75,000 = $25,000.

  What if you want more flexibility with indirect rates, or numbers and percentages in general? That’s where Definitions come in.

Definitions

Define rates that change over time or are used by multiple rows.

• Indirect rates, salaries, fringe rates, and other expenses such as tuition can all be defined and re-used via the “Definitions” section at the bottom of the budget. This allows you to specify values that change over time (such as salary raises) instead of using a single, static value. It also allows you to input the numbers once and then use them across multiple rows.
• Assign a definition in place of a fixed numeric value by clicking on the downward-pointing arrow button next to any indirect rate, salary, fringe rate, or “other”. If no applicable definitions have been created, choose Changing over time... to create and assign a new definition for that purpose. The new definition will appear at the top of the screen so you can easily edit it. (See below for more on editing definitions.)

• View or edit a linked definition by clicking on the quick-access button next to the definition name. This will temporarily bring that definition to the top of the screen. Click the checkmark button to hide the definition again when you're done.

  You can also find all definitions listed at the bottom of the budget file.

• Create a new definition for future use by clicking the + button at the bottom of the “Definitions” section of the budget.

• Currency definitions ($) are used for salaries and “Other” expenses such as tuition. When used in calculations, they specify the dollar value to use at each point in time.

  Rate definitions (%) are used for indirect rates and fringe rates. When these rates are used in calculations, the blocks specify what percent value to use at each point in time.
• Specify a definition's value over time by adding blocks to the timeline, just like you would on any other row.
• Automatic repeats — By default, definition blocks automatically repeat themselves every year, indefinitely into the future. Such “auto-filled” values appear in a lighter gray color to indicate that they were automatically created by the software. They will continue to automatically update whenever you make edits earlier in the timeline.
• Specify an automatic yearly increase by editing the Yearly increase value in the left panel of a definition row. This will cause all auto-filled values to automatically increase each year by the percentage indicated. The auto-increased values and the date of each yearly change are shown in the light gray value blocks.
• Manually edit auto-filled values by double clicking on the lighter-gray block(s) you wish to edit. This will convert it from an auto-filled value to a normal block that you can edit like any other block.
• Turn off automatic repeats by clicking on the arrow that appears when hovering over the field and selecting Turn off automatic repeats.
• Add indirects. If Add indirects is specified on a definition’s left panel, and the definition is applied to an expense row, and a block on the expense row is assigned to one or more funding sources that have indirect rates specified, then Spendlab will automatically deduct indirect costs from the applicable funding source balances.
• No indirects. If No indirects is chosen, indirect costs will never be added to expenses defined in the definition row. In other words, the costs specified in the definition row will be treated as exempt from indirects even if funded by a funding source that has a non-zero indirect rate.

Export Data

Export the underlying expense calculations for further analysis.

• Export all expense data by scrolling to the top of the budget file and choosing Export data... near the top right of the document.

  This will download a data file in standard CSV format that you can open in a spreadsheet or other software for further analysis and reporting.

  The exported file contains all of the expense calculations in the budget, including all past and future projected amounts. The data is broken out by month, funding source, expense row, expense type, and direct vs. indirect components.

  For example, here are the first few rows of expense data for a budget which includes "Startup funds" supporting a person named "Jose". Each row represents the smallest unit of cost used by Spendlab when running calculations.

  Calculate custom totals by opening the exported CSV file in a spreadsheet program and using a pivot table or other built-in functions to filter and sum the data as needed.

  For example, if you want to know the total amount spent on direct and indirect costs for each grant, you could create a pivot table like the following.

Shortcuts

Some useful features that make your Spendlab workflow more efficient.

Privacy

Privacy and security is built into the architecture of Spendlab.

Contact us

Questions and feedback are welcome! Email Lisa at .