Funds & Ledgers

Alma won't let you create a new fiscal year in the Configuration menu. You'll have to roll over a ledger and the system will create a new fiscal year for you.

In the Acquisitions menu, select Advanced Tools > Rollover Ledgers.

Above the Rollover Ledgers list, click Add Job.

In the Add Job menu:

• Unless you want balances and/or charges to roll over, choose None in the Create Allocation From dropdown.

• Choose the appropriate Ledger(s).

• Under Action, choose Copy.

• To force the new fiscal year, the Create status needs to be set as Active.

• Choose the appropriate fiscal year (usually the current FY) in the From Year dropdown.

• Click the Add and Close button.

Follow this same process for rolling over each ledger (books, ebooks, serials, databases).

You'll need to rename the fiscal year that was just created. This is a CARLI requirement.

In the Configuration menu, choose Acquisitions, then click on General > Fund and Ledger Fiscal Period.

The new fiscal year will be named after its opening and closing dates. Rename the new year FY-**** (the full 4-digit ending year).

Leave the immediate past FY, the current FY, and the new FY Active; mark all others as Closed.

Click the Save button.

If you need to create a new ledger (rather than rolling it over from the previous FY), go to Acquisitions > Acquisitions Infrastructure > Funds and Ledgers and clicking Add Ledger at the top right of the screen.

In the Summary Details box:

• Name: Per Rolfing best practice, enter the type of material being purchased with these funds.

• Code: Per Rolfing best practice, enter the first two letters of the ledger name in all caps.

  • You will not be able to change this code after you've hit the Save button. If you have an error here, you'll have to delete the entire ledger and start again.

• Owned by & Available for: Enter Trinity International University for all ledgers.

• Currency: Select US Dollar.

• Fiscal period: Choose the appropriate fiscal year.

In the Reports box's Display Report: Select Fund Balance.

In the Rules box:

• Overencumbrance & Overexpenditure allowed: No limits

• Encumbrances, Expenditures, & Transfers prior to fiscal period (days): 0 for one-time purchases, 365 for subscriptions

• Fiscal period end encumbrance & expenditure grace period (days): At least 30 

Click the Activate button.

Ledger rules establish the amount and timing of expenditures in Alma. To create charges "outside the limits" of the dates of the fiscal year or the allocated fund balances, you'll need to set the appropriate rules.

Go to Acquisitions > Acquisitions Infrastructure > Funds and Ledgers.

Choose the correct fiscal year by opening up the Facets on the left side of the page and choosing the appropriate Fiscal Period.

Find the Ledger (i.e., Books, Ebooks, Databases, Serials) you want to change, then click its Edit button. 

• Rolfing's best practice is to edit rules at the ledger level. While Alma lets you edit rules at the fund level, it's much harder to keep track of and can lead to errors in bookkeeping.

In the General box of the Summary Details page, you have the ability to edit the following fields:

• Name: Per Rolfing best practice, use the type of material being purchased with these funds.

• External ID: Use the university budget line of the material being purchased. (This will allow the API built into the budget spreadsheet to cross-check invoices.)

  • Books: 10-4102-6500-IL

  • Serials: 10-4102-6501-IL

  • Ebooks: 10-4102-6503-IL

  • Databases: 10-4102-6505-IL 

• Owned by & Available for: Use Trinity International University for all ledgers.

• Currency: Use US Dollar for all ledgers.

  • From time to time, we purchase materials from other countries -- if the price is in foreign currency, convert it to USD and enter it into the Alma POL. Then wait until the invoice clears CARS and use that amount to finalize the invoice price in Alma.

In the Reports box's Display Report: Select Fund Balance.

In the Rules box, enter the following information:

• Overencumbrance & Overexpenditure allowed: No limits

  • This will allow you to spend beyond fund line allocations. Otherwise, you'll get error messages on POLs and invoices that include fully expended funds.

• Encumbrances, Expenditures, & Transfers prior to fiscal period (days):

  • Books & Ebooks: 0

    • Since these are one-time purchases, setting this number to 0 will keep you from accidentally assigning purchases to the wrong FY.

  • Serials & Databases: 365

    • These subscriptions run for calendar years, so you'll need to enter invoices for the next FY while you're still in the current one.

• Fiscal period end encumbrance & expenditure grace period (days): At least 30

  • This will give you a little extra time to process end-of-FY POLs and invoices after April 30 has passed.

If the fund is inactive, hit the Activate button in the top right corner; if it's already active (i.e., the button reads Deactivate), hit the Save button.

To delete a ledger, two conditions must be met: all its funds have been deleted, and the ledger is deactivated.

Delete the funds using the Deleting Fund Lines instructions below.

Find the ledger (you may need to).

In the Funds and Ledgers list, click on the ledger's action menu and select Deactivate.

Take off the list's Active Status filter (if it's applied).

Click on the ledger's action menu again and select Delete, then Confirm the pop-up message.

Find the ledger you'd like to add the fund to and click the Edit button.

Select the Funds tab, then click Add Fund > Allocated Fund.

In the Summary Details screen, enter the following information:

• Name: Per Rolfing best practice, enter the ledger name, a hyphen surrounded by spaces, and the name of the department/category, in title case.

• Code: Per Rolfing best practice, enter the first three letters of the fund name, a hyphen, and the two-letter ledger code, all in lower case.

• External ID: Enter the university budget line of the material being purchased.

• Available for: Trinity International University

• Fund Type: Expenditures

• Display Report: Fund Balance

• Per Rolfing best practice, do not override the rules information.

Click the Activate button.

Alma won't let you set fund allocations in the fund itself -- you have to set them within their respective ledgers. In the main menu, select Acquisitions > Acquisitions Infrastructure > Funds and Ledgers, then Edit the ledger where you'd like to allocate funds.

• Make sure you're choosing the appropriate fiscal year, especially if you have multiple FYs active.

In Summary Details, click the Funds tab.

Find the line you want to fund and click its Edit button.

Select the Transactions tab, then click Allocate Funds.

• Enter the Allocation amount and your name (if you're a liaison) or the fund's liaison in the 1st reporting code.

• Click the Add allocation transaction button, then click Confirm on the pop-up message.

Click the Save button to exit the fund editor.

Once you've made a fund allocation you can't edit it. To change the allocation, you'll need to delete it and add a new one.

Click on the Transactions tab of the fund's Summary Details. 

Find the allocation you'd like to delete, click Action Menu > Delete, then click Confirm on the pop-up message.

This option will allow you to choose both the fund you want to transfer out of and the fund that you want to transfer into. You can also make multiple transfers in a single session.

In the main menu, go to Acquisitions > Acquisitions Infrastructure > Transfer Funds.

In the Funds Transfer window:

• Choose the appropriate From fund and To fund.

  • If you have multiple fiscal years currently active, be careful to pick the one with the correct balance -- it won't give you FY information. 

• Enter the Amount you'd like to transfer.

• Choose your name (if you're a liaison) or the fund liaison in the 1st reporting code.

• Click the Add transfer transaction button, then Confirm on the pop-up message.

This option will allow you to transfer funds before the transfer window opens (per the ledger's rules). However, you have to be in the fund you want to transfer out of (i.e., the one that currently holds the money) to use this option.

Select the Transactions tab of the fund's Summary Details, then click Transfer Funds and enter the following information:

• To fund: The fund you want the money to go to

• Amount: The total you want to transfer

• 1st reporting code: Your name (if you're a liaison) or the fund's liaison

Click the Add transfer transaction button, then Confirm on the pop-up message.

Click the Save button to exit the fund editor.

In Alma, you can't delete a fund line if it's active or has transactions attached to it.

To deactivate a fund line:

• Go to Acquisitions > Acquisitions Infrastructure > Funds and Ledgers.

• Click on the action menu of the fund and select Deactivate.

Delete all the transactions from the fund line using the delete fund allocations steps above.

To delete the line after you've deactivated it and deleted its transactions:

• Go back to the Funds and Ledgers list.

• Take off the Active Status filter (if it's applied to the list).

• Click on the action menu of fund and select Delete, then Confirm on the pop-up message.