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Loyola University Maryland

Office of Budget and Planning

Glossary

Common financial terms that you might hear while communicating with our department.

Budget Adjustment

  • The act of amending the budget by moving funds from one category or line item to another.
  • A temporary adjustment is a one-time transfer that affects the budget in the current fiscal year.
  • A permanent adjustment is a transfer that affects the budget in the current fiscal year and all fiscal years going forward.

Budget to Actual Report

  • Compares fiscal year-to-date (YTD) actuals (revenues and expenditures) against original and adjusted budgets.

Encumbrances

  • Funds set aside in MyBudget for a transaction that has yet to occur.

Expenditures

  • The recognition of the expending of resources of any fund group towards the objectives of that group.

Expenditure Transfer

  • The process used to move expenditures from one account to another.

Fiscal Year

  • The University's fiscal year begins June 1st.

Fiscal Year Close / "The Close"

  • The series of processes performed in May and June of every year to finalize the financial information for the fiscal year in preparation for the University's annual financial statement audit.

General Ledger (GL)

  • The general ledger of the University is a record of the University's budgeting and financial transactions.  The general ledger includes budget transactions, revenue and expense transactions, encumbrances, assets, liabilities and fund balances.

Opening Budget

  • Original budget allocation set at the beginning of the fiscal year.

  • An adjusted budget is the original budget allocation set at the beginning of the year plus or minus any temporary adjustments made during the fiscal year.

Transfers

  • Amounts moved between fund groups to be used for the objectives of the recipient fund group.

  • Mandatory transfers – debt service, loan funds, etc.

  • Nonmandatory transfers – at the discretion of the governing board

Zero-Based Budgeting (ZBB)

  • A method of budgeting in which all existing programs must justify all funds requested for each new fiscal year. Zero-based budgeting starts from "zero base" and every area within an organization is analyzed for its respective needs the related expense.

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