Instrumentl is committed to being your all-in-one platform for the full grant lifecycle—this includes post-award management! We know Grant Managers and Program Teams need a streamlined way to monitor grant finances, which is why we offer Budget Spenddown Tracking.

Simplify the financials for your organization's fundraising efforts. Jump ahead to a section by clicking one of the three components of Budget Spenddown Tracking below:

I. Expense Categories: Organize your awards into different areas of spending.

II. Add Expenses: Import expenses in bulk or enter them one-by-one.

III. Spenddown Tracking: Monitoring spend at the award and project levels

Instrumentl's Budget Spenddown feature is tailored for managing expenses through the grant management lens. View your spend metrics with in-depth and at-a-glance charts and visuals. Increase financial visibility for grants, streamline communications and save valuable time!

Spenddown helps your organization spend within your award budget, reducing financial mismanagement risks:

Once you've been awarded your grant, you'll want to add Expense Categories to your budget. First, ensure the opportunity is in the Awarded Status:

Next, open the opportunity from the Tracker or Awards View and navigate to the 'Financials' tab within the saved grant page.

Under 'Budget & Expenses', select + Add Expense Category.

This will trigger a window to pop up on the right-hand side of your screen. Enter the category's Name (required field) as well as Description and Amount Budgeted (both optional):

Once finished, click Save at the bottom:

You can always add or make changes to the Description and Amount Budgeted later, as well as rename the category by selecting Edit from the Category Actions menu (three-dot button on the far-right):

If you wish to remove a category from your budget, select Delete from the Category Actions menu (see below).

Once you've created an Expense Category, you can select + Expense to enter an individual expense manually from the Category Actions dropdown menu.

Alternatively, you can open the + Add Expenses dropdown menu and select + Add an expense. With this workflow, you need to select the category in the next step.

You'll see the following 'New Expense' window appear from the right-hand side. Enter the Transaction Date and Amount, and then choose a Category, if not populated already (all required fields). You may also enter a Description, Notes and a Transaction ID.

When finished, click Save.

Your new expense will be slotted within the designated category in chronological order of Transaction Date. The budget view of expenses displays the Transaction Date, Description, Notes and Amount.

Save time and add your expenses in bulk by importing an expense spreadsheet into Instrumentl. You can simply generate a CSV or Microsoft Excel (.xlsx) file from your current accounting software, such as QuickBooks, Sage, MIP, Financial Edge NXT, etc.

1. Change the opportunity's Status to Awarded and navigate to the 'Financials' tab.

2. Next, open the + Add Expenses dropdown menu and select Import expenses.

3. Open the Expenses Import Template in Google Sheets > File > Make a copy.

4. You can copy & paste data from your accounting software into your copy of the Google Sheets template. (Be sure to delete row 2 of sample data!)

5. Download the Google Sheet as a .csv/.xlsx file, or you can first download the template as a .csv/.xlsx file and then enter your expense data into said file.

When your spreadsheet is ready, go back to the Financials page under the 'Import Expenses' tab (follow step 2 above or navigate to Account > Financials)

The import process is organized into four sequential stages.

Click Select Expenses File.

Upload your CSV/Excel spreadsheet > click Next.

Select the Instrumentl Award(s) from the dropdown menu, ensure your Amount Awarded is accurate, then click Next.

Map each "Org Expense Category" from your spreadsheet import to a Grant Expense Category in your Instrumentl award budget. If you haven't already created the categories you wish to assign to the expenses in this import, you can create new Expense Categories at this stage.

Enter a Budgeted Amount for each Expense Category > select Import Expenses.

Check that your spreadsheet was imported accurately. Notice any mistakes? Start Over. Everything looks good? Go To Awards View.

🎊 Congrats! You've finished the expense import. Now view your expense data in your award's 'Financials' tab under the section 'Budget & Expenses':

In order to make any changes to expenses in your Budget, expand the relevant Expense Category to view its expenses by clicking the dropdown arrow 🔽

Next, open the Expense Actions menu (three-dot button on the far right) for the expense you wish to modify.

To edit an expense, open the Expense Actions > select Edit.

An 'Edit Expense' window will open from the right-hand side with the same fields as when manually entering a new expense.

When you're finished making changes, select Save (or Cancel to undo edits).

To delete an expense, open the Expense Actions > select Delete.

Alternatively, you can select Delete Expense from the 'Edit Expense' window.

To "bulk delete" expenses, you can delete an Expense Category to remove all expenses assigned to it. Apart from this action, there is no other way to delete multiple expenses simultaneously.

If you wish to include an expense in your budget, but not count it toward your spenddown tracking, you can "ignore" it. From the Expense Actions menu, select Ignore.

When you've ignored an expense, you will still see it listed in your budget and Expense Category just as before, except for three things:

To revert an ignored expense back to its original, default state, select Unignore from the Expense Actions menu. This will result in the expense transaction amount affecting the calculation of the total amount spent across all financial metrics.

In the Awards View, your dashboard displays how your Spenddown is tracking.

It defaults to showing the percentage (%), but hovering your cursor over the percentage metric shows both the amount Available and the Total spent ($).

You'll also see both a Payments and Spenddown column in your Awards View, allowing you to track award spend (as well as the payments received from the funder*).

*Learn more about Payments Tracking.

Within an awarded grant's 'Financials' tab, you'll find an 'Overview' section. This includes the amount awarded, spent and remaining. It also visualizes your tracking during the grant period. The On Track and Off Track icons are calculated based on the amount you've spent thus far and where you are in the grant period.

If you see Untracked, you need to add a Start & End date in the 'Overview' tab of the saved grant (not to be confused with the 'Overview' section described above).

Scroll down further in the 'Financials' tab to view a breakdown of your award spend by Expense Category. Each category has its own graph showing the $ and % of how much is spent and the remaining amount allocated.

Budget Spenddown Tracking eliminates uncertainty about grant financials with intuitive visuals to support smarter decision-making. We’re excited to continue improving Instrumentl's post-award management capabilities!

If you have any questions about our Budget Spenddown Tracking feature, simply start a conversation with our friendly Support team via Messenger when logged in to your account, or email us at hello@instrumentl.com.