Report Designer: Frequently asked questions

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Formatting and design

  1. Select the cell, row, or column where the formula or function should be inserted, and then choose Insert > Formula.
  2. At the top of the Formula dialog, select the Variables option to specify variables from the tree view, or the Functions option to specify dates, range of date counts, row counts, running totals, etc.

For more details, see Report Designer: Working with formulas.

This is useful, for example, if you want to view the amounts for multiple cash account as a total amount on a balance sheet.

Cash accounts detailed
Detail

Cash accounts total
Total

  1. On the row in which you want to display the total, delete the cell contents for the description and enter your new description.
  2. Select any cell in the row with an amount variable and mark the Print total amount checkbox in the Cell Properties section of the Design Tools frame.
  3. Optional: Insert a blank row between the total row and other non-total rows.

For more details, see Report Designer: Showing the total of multiple accounts.

Rows and columns are hidden by setting the row height or column width to zero. Therefore, you can show the hidden row or column by resetting the row height or column width.

  1. Select the non-hidden rows or columns on either side of the hidden row or column while pressing the SHIFT key.
  2. Right-click one of the selected rows/columns and choose Row height or Column width, as appropriate.
  3. Set the row height to a single-digit number larger than zero. (On many reports the row height is set to 0.15625 inches by default.)

For more details, see Report Designer: Showing hidden rows.

To change a plus sign to a negative sign on an amount value populating in a report, follow these steps.

  1. Click the cell in the report layout and choose Format > Cells.
  2. In the Format Cells dialog, click the Format tab and choose Amount from the Category pane.
  3. Mark the Multiply by -1 checkbox.

For more details, see Report Designer: Change the sign of a number.

  1. In Report Designer, click Letters in the documents list frame and double-click the letter.
  2. Place your cursor where you want to insert the date and choose Insert > Formula.
  3. Choose the Functions option at the top of the Formula dialog.
  4. Select the Date row in the Description grid and click the Variable  Variable icon icon to open the Variables tree for the Variable 1 field.
  5. Choose System > Financial Statement and select the Period End Date variable and click OK.
  6. Use the Date Format field and Period field to select the appropriate date format and period for the variable.

Example

The formula that will display the full month, 2-digit day, and 4-digit year for the prior year is: [Date(System.FinancialStatement.PeriodEndDate,"MM/dd/yyyy","1PY")]

Formula dialog

Note: You can use the Insert > Functions dialog this way to easily format and add Period End Date variables on your reports.

For more details, see Report Designer: Adding a prior period variable to a letter.

Report options

The Accounting CS library contains payroll reports available for import that will display payroll information by location and department distributions.

Adding the Reports Library to your Home Dashboard

  1. Choose View > Home Dashboard and click the Add View link in the upper-right corner of the screen.
  2. Enter Reports Library in the Description field of the Add View dialog and then click OK.
  3. Click the Select Portlets link, mark the checkbox for Accounting CS Library, and then click OK

Importing reports from the Accounting CS Library

  1. In the Reports Library view, scroll down to the Payroll section.
  2. Find the report that you need in the Title column. You can view an example of each report by clicking the Preview  Preview icon icon.
  3. Click the Import  Import icon icon to import the report. You will see a confirmation message if the import is successful.
  4. You can now preview and print the report via the File > Print Reports screen or you can modify it via the Report Designer.

For more details, see Using the Accounting CS Library to import reports, financial statements, and letters.

By default, general ledger accounts are sorted by account number on financial statements, but you can change the sort order by selecting new filtering and sorting options (specifically, the Chart of Accounts Core options) in the Report tab of the Page Setup dialog. This will give you the option to sort by GL Account Description in the Report Designer.

For details, see Report Designer: sorting accounts on financial statements.

Account segments, which you can create for the client in the Setup > Account Segments screen of Accounting CS, are used for reporting purposes in the Report Designer.

This method (which is the first of two methods) provides a report that includes columns for each segment, similar to a side-by- side comparison.

  1. In the Report Designer, select the appropriate accounting report or financial statement.
  2. In the design grid, copy and paste the amount columns for each segment that you want to compare.
  3. Highlight a cell or column and then click the Ellipsis Ellipsis button button next to the Segments field in the Cell or Column Properties section of the Design Tools frame.

    Note: Because segment selections apply to account activity, the selected cell or column should contain the [ChartofAccountsActivity.Core.Amount] variable.

  4. In the Segment Selections dialog, select Segment Code from the drop-down list in the Segment filter field; the application displays another drop-down list with filter options.
  5. Select is to select a single segment. (For example, select Segment Code, then is, and then Location 1.)

    Show dialog

    segment selections dialog - 1

  6. To add multiple segments in the same cell or column, click the Add Add button button, and then select the appropriate segment codes.
  7. Click OK to close the Segment Selections dialog and return to the Report Designer.

For more details, see Report Designer: Selecting segment codes in reports and financial statements.

You can make specific regions of a report optional, enabling you to include or exclude those regions when you preview or print the report. Therefore, if you make the region of the report containing the detailed payroll check information optional, you can exclude that region when you print the report and print only the totals, as shown in the following steps.

  1. Open the Payroll Journal report in the Report Designer.
  2. Highlight the Main region and choose Region Properties in the Design Tools frame.
  3. Mark the Optional region checkbox.
  4. Clear the Print by default checkbox.

Optional region

For more details, see Report Designer: Region mode.

If you set up certain balance types to be rounded for reporting purposes, you may get an Out Of Balance message when you preview a report or financial statement.

  • Verify that you do not have any filters applied to the report when you preview it. Filters could make the report total a non-zero number, which prompts the "Out Of Balance" message.
  • Display at least 2 decimal places on the report. When decimals are hidden, the individual numbers are rounded (50 cents and higher rounds up, 49 cents and lower rounds down), which may cause a report to be off by $1 or $2.
  • If you customized this report, verify that the conditional expression on the "out of balance" text is referencing the correct cells.

For more details, see: Report Designer: Rounding on reports and financial statements.

Troubleshooting and tips & tricks

Before you make changes to a predefined report, letter, or financial statement in Report Designer, we recommend that you choose File > Save As to save the report with a different name. To restore a predefined report that has been modified, you can choose File > Restore Default.

For more details, see Report Designer: Save as / Restore default.

There are a number of things you can do to find out where the problem lies.

  • Try deleting multiple sections, rows, or columns on the report or financial statement. Preview it again to see if removing a particular section resolves the issue. This can help narrow down the area of the report that may be causing the problem.

    Note: If you make a mistake and delete a section without having saved a copy, choose Edit > Undo to undo the deletion.

  • If you are working in a report that you have customized from a predefined report, try previewing or printing the default version of the report and compare it to your customized version. If the issue doesn't seem to appear in the default version, then you can compare the differences between the two versions of the report. Use that information to make changes on the customized report that may resolve the issue.

    Note: If the original version of the predefined report is no longer available, you'll need to restore the default version. To avoid over-writing your customized version, choose File > Save As to create a new, renamed copy of it. Now it's safe to right-click your customized version of the report in the Reports List frame and choose Restore Default.

  • If there are any hidden rows on the report, unhide the rows to verify that no variables, conditional expressions, or repeating regions in the hidden rows are causing the issue.

For more details, see Report Designer: Save as / Restore default.

You can change a total line to a detail line to see what accounts are included in a total by clearing the option to print a total and changing the repeating regions if needed.

For more details, see Report designer: Showing detail of accounts in place of a total.

You can use the Color fill  Color fill icon in the Formatting Toolbar to color code cells, rows, and columns to help troubleshoot missing or incorrect data on the report.

For more details, see: Report Designer: Troubleshooting missing data using color.

If you have a report displaying an Out Of Balance message or a financial statement in which not all balances are pulling in correctly, it might be due to an incorrect selection of account groupings in the Cell Properties of a cell or set of cells within a row. It may help to do the following.

  1. Verify all sections of the Balance Sheet.
  2. Ensure all accounts are included in the Balance Sheet.
  3. Print the Financial Statement Worksheet report for the current year (File > Print - Options dialog) and review the Totals row in the Balance Sheet columns.

For more details, see Report Designer: Verifying balances.

The cell or row may contain a conditional expression. A green corner on the top-right of the cell or row indicate that it contains an if > then statement.

For example, on our standard financial statement, Balance Sheet – Current Year, there is a conditional expression on cell A51 for Total Equity. One of the conditions states that IF the client entity type is a 1040, 1041, or 5500, THEN print Total Equity, while another conditional on that same cell states that IF the client entity type is a 1065, THEN print Total Partner’s Equity.

Conditional expression

To view or modify an existing conditional expression, select the cell or row with the conditional expression, then select Format > Conditional Expression.

For more details, see Report Designer: Insert > Conditional Expression dialog.

See Report Designer: Conditional Expression examples to view some commonly used conditional expressions.

You can also view predefined reports in Report Designer and look in the Design grid for any green corners in cells or rows. Click the cell or row with the conditional expression, then choose Format > Conditional Expression to view the settings for the conditional expression, then preview the report to see how it modifies the data. You can also choose Insert > Remove Conditional Expression and try previewing the same report without the condition to see how the data would display without it.

The text size of the variables may be too large for the cells. Change the font size, row height, or cell size to resolve the issue.

For more details, see Report Designer: One report is blank.

If a column in the Design grid overlaps a vertical page break, it can cause a blank page to print between each page in the report. To prevent a blank page from printing, remove the page break or adjust the vertical sizing of the column.

For more details, see Report designer: Removing blank pages that print between pages in a report.

There may be blank space at the bottom of the letter. Use the following steps to remove it.

  1. Choose File > Report Designer.
  2. Choose the Letters button on the lower left.
  3. Double-click a letter to open it in the design grid.
  4. Hover the mouse pointer over the word Footer to the left of the letter until it changes to a double headed arrow.
  5. Drag the footer region up to the bottom of the last line of text to remove the extra white space.

For more details see Report Designer: Letters print a second blank page.

When reports and financial statements repeat data, it's usually caused by one or more rows being incorrectly grouped. A repeating level is marked by a vertical bracket in the left margin of the design grid.

 Repeating level

Each row within a report or financial statement that has a variable included on it needs to be grouped into repeating level, including any hidden rows.

For more details, see Report Designer: Using repeating elements in reports or statements.

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