Scenario Planning

The scenario planning tool is available on each payments dashboard. This tool allows the exploration of different scenarios with requests and payments to see what the potential budgetary impact would be. It also allows you to add new requests and edits to existing requests and unpaid payments directly from the scenario planning view. This forecasting tool can be used when considering a plan for both invited and unsolicited applications.

Access scenario planning from an existing payments dashboard.

1. Click Payments & Approvals in the upper navigation bar, and then click Dashboards.
2. Click the name of a payments dashboard.
   
   
   
3. Click Scenario Planning.
   
   

The filters and criteria set for the payments dashboard apply in the scenario planning view, but the fiscal years can be adjusted as needed. Additional fiscal years can be added in Calendar Settings from Admin Tools & Settings.

 

Summary Table

The summary table displays payment numbers broken down by request dispositions and statuses for each fiscal year. If the payments dashboard is configured to display budget data, the budget and balance are displayed here as well.

Code Allocations Table

The code allocations table allows you to select a code type and view payment amounts for requests with that code type assigned.

The payments total is displayed for each disposition and code, along with its percentage of the fiscal year budget, if available. Click a code to view allocations for its subcodes.

One fiscal year of data is displayed at a time. Select a different fiscal year from the dropdown.

Toggle off a request disposition to exclude the data from the table.

Request Dispositions

A dropdown section is available for each request disposition other than the Declined disposition. The total requested, recommended, or approved amount for the requests within each disposition is displayed on the top tab once the dropdown section is opened.

The total scheduled or paid payment amounts for each included fiscal year are also displayed.

Additional fields can be added to the request information shown in the sections. Once a field is added, it is also available to edit on requests within the sections, as explained in the next section. Any additional fields are added for all users with access to the dashboard.

1. Click Edit Fields.
   
   
2. Check the box next to each field to add, and then click Save.
   1. After selecting an additional field, click it to edit the name or remove it as a selection.
      
      

Click a column header in a section to sort the requests based on that column. This sort order only applies for the user making the change, and does not affect the view for other users.

Update Requests and Payments

Requests and their payments can be updated directly and efficiently from the sections in scenario planning. Edits made here update the actual request or payment records. Approved requests cannot be edited in scenario planning.

For a request not yet approved, its status can be updated from the dropdown.

Click a request in a section to view the details, make edits, and update or add payments.

• Click the pencil icon next to a request field to edit it. 
  • Any of the default fields and any additional fields added are available to edit.
    
    
• Click the pencil icon next to an existing payment record to update the amount, scheduled date, or coding.
  
  
• Click Add Another Payment to add a new payment record to the request.

Add a Request

A new request with a status in the Exploring or Planning dispositions can be added directly from scenario planning. 

1. Click Add New Request.
   
   
2. Enter the applicable information, and then click Save. 
   1. Requests contains details on adding a new request.
      
      

A renewal request record can also be created directly from scenario planning. Click the icon to view grants with upcoming renewal notification dates and create renewal requests. Grant Renewals contains additional details.

Percentage Coding in Scenario Planning

 

A payments dashboard can be set to be viewed by a code type that tracks percentages. If the dashboard is also filtered to a specific code within that code type, there are details to understand about how this impacts totals in scenario planning. 

• Summary - The totals in this table do account for percentage coding. These totals display the sum of the payment amounts allocated just to the filtering code.
• Disposition Totals - For each disposition, the total recommended or approved amount displays the sum of the recommended or approved amounts for the requests in the disposition list. This does not take into account any percentage allocations across codes for the requests.
• Disposition Fiscal Year Totals - Each fiscal year column in a disposition displays the sum of the payments scheduled or paid in that fiscal year for the requests in the disposition list. This does not take into account any percentage allocations across codes for the payments. 

As an example, consider a scenario planning view filtered to the Education code for a Program Area code type. The $100,000 request shown below in the Pending disposition has 75% allocated to Education and 25% allocated to Arts.

• The total requested amount for the disposition displays $100,000, as this does not take into account the percentage coding.
  
  
• The request has a single payment of $100,000 scheduled in 2025. This payment has 75% ($75,000) allocated to Education and 25% ($25,000) allocated to Arts. The 2025 fiscal year total column for the disposition displays $100,000, as this does not take into account the percentage coding.
  
  
• The request described is the only request in the Pending disposition for the purpose of this example. In the Summary table, the Pending disposition for 2025 displays $75,000, as this does take into account the percentage coding. It is only displaying the total allocated to the Education code.
  
  

For a request in a disposition list, click an amount to view details. This displays the payments scheduled or paid for the request in the corresponding fiscal year, along with any percentage coding allocations. The bolded amount corresponds with the filtering code, and this is the amount that contributes to the totals in the Summary table.