Tech Forum

The instructions we received after the CUBS conversion said we should have had a zero balance or negative balance as a ward. Instead, we had a positive balance of $952.35. This was because four checks written in 2009 for a total of $952.35 incorrectly came out of our "Other" accounts, and after the start of 2010, we went back and corrected the categories for those checks. At the time, this did not cause a problem, because we did not use our entire budget for 2009, and it put our "Other" accounts where they should have been. After the CUBS conversion, however, because the "transfer" from one category to another was made in 2010, it left us with a negative ending balance of $952.35 for 2009 and a positive balance of $952.35 for 2010, even before receiving our allocation check from the stake.

I had assumed that CHQ would go in and correct the situation at some point since the conversion, so I didn't consider that money actually to be available. However, we received our Q4 allocation check from the stake today (finally), and it is short $952.35 when comparing our total allocation and expenses for 2010. Apparently, the stake looked at our "transfers" for 2010 as being equal to our budget expenditures -- the amount of the total transfers for this year (including the $952.35) is exactly equal to what the stake listed as our "budget expended."

So, the result is that, after depositing our allocation check from the stake, we have exactly the correct amount of money remaining in our budget that we should have, considering our actual budget allocation for 2010 and our actual expenditures for 2010. However, on our income and expense report, the negative budget balance carried over from 2009, leaving us with an available amount that is $952.35 less than our remaining budget, and it shows us having $952.35 more money in the "Other" accounts than we should have.

What's the best way to correct this situation? I could transfer the money from the "Other" accounts into the budget, leaving all of the balances correct, but will the Church Finance Department come in and see that positive balance after the CUBS conversion and take it out of our account to make up for the "negative" ending balance in 2009?

Would I be fixing the problem by going back to the original checks, changing the category back to the "Other" account, then writing new checks to those accounts with the "extra" $952.35 in our budget? Theoretically, this would zero out our 2009 balance, and it would get rid of the extra $952.35 that we had after the CUBS conversion. But would it just create more headaches in the long run?

AJT wrote:So, the result is that, after depositing our allocation check from the stake, we have exactly the correct amount of money remaining in our budget that we should have, considering our actual budget allocation for 2010 and our actual expenditures for 2010. However, on our income and expense report, the negative budget balance carried over from 2009, leaving us with an available amount that is $952.35 less than our remaining budget, and it shows us having $952.35 more money in the "Other" accounts than we should have.

I don't understand this statement. Under CUBS, the Budget category contains hard dollars, just like Ward Missionary and Other always have. Thus the only reasonable definition of "money remaining" for any category is the ending balance showing on on Income and Expense Report. As of the end of a reporting period, that should also be the amount showing on the Unit Financial Statement. And yet you are saying that the amount of "money remaining" is different from the ending balance on an I&E report. Where are you looking to find the amount of "money remaining"?

In order to say whether your stake made a mistake on calculation, we would also have to know how the stake treated carry forward of remaining balances at the end of 2009 -- did they allow you to carry forward any surplus (by increasing your 2010 allocation by the surplus amount), or did they treat the 2009 surplus as 0 when calculating your 2010 allocation?

And regardless of the Budget amounts, I find it very strange that post-CUBS you would have more in Other than you should have. The credits made in early 2010 that increased your Other balance back to "where they should have been" pre-CUBS should still be present and have the same effect post-CUBS. It sounds like you are saying that the beginning balance of Other is off by that amount, or that those credits somehow are showing up twice. Is that correct?

Alan_Brown wrote:
And regardless of the Budget amounts, I find it very strange that post-CUBS you would have more in Other than you should have. The credits made in early 2010 that increased your Other balance back to "where they should have been" pre-CUBS should still be present and have the same effect post-CUBS. It sounds like you are saying that the beginning balance of Other is off by that amount, or that those credits somehow are showing up twice. Is that correct?

This might be a symptom of a data-conversion bug that affected many other units, including my own. In our case, the converted Other accounts have less than they should have because some transfers and corrections were not handled correctly when the CUBS data was reloaded in October. This is a known issue, and we are still expecting a remedial data load to fix it. I suggest calling the Finance Department to confirm that this is the root cause in this case.