Release Notes - UPM - 2023.06

Highlights

Apliqo UX Version upgrade

Apliqo FPM 2023.06 includes the latest UX version 2023.05 FP1.

Planning - Driver seeding

The driver seeding process has been re-engineered to make the top-down setting of planning drivers (forecast method, seasonality etc.) more versatile. The UI has also been improved in order to improve the user experience.

The top part of the form, offering the selection of the target area to set the drivers in is now reduced to only the relevant business segments of a given plan area. It also displays the chosen captions for the business segments (e.g. Cost Center instead of BSEG 1).

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To limit the intersections that drivers are set in, different filter modes have been introduced. You can now choose whether to:

• Set all drivers (all valid business segment combinations in the selected area will be set).

• Replace existing drivers (if intersections already have a driver set they will be replaced

• Filter by Version and Year (this is the previous functionality, drivers will be set in all intersections that have values in the selected version and year combination, e.g. previous year actuals).

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For more information please refer to the updated documentation.

Planning - Default drivers and subsets

A new app has been introduced to set up picklists of drivers available to planning users as well as the default method per account. Access the app in Apliqo Settings → Planning → Planning Picklists and Defaults. You are able to set the default driver picklist per plan type (Revenue, Expenses, Balance Sheet) and define exceptions as well as the default driver to be used in top-down planning per account. If needed, you can define different picklists and drivers for specific business segment combinations. Please refer to the documentation for detailed instructions.

Balance Sheet Planning - New and improved methods

All available balance sheet planning methods / drivers have been reviewed and amended. Please review the full list of available drivers in Apliqo Settings → Planning → Planning Profiles and Methods to determine possible impacts on your currently used methods and assess whether some of the new or improved methods are useful for your next planning cycle.

Notable additions to the list of planning methods are:

• 3 or 6 month average movement plus value or percentage

• Percentage of Revenue, COGS or Inventory (movement)

• Enter monthly movement

• Itemised monthly movement (detailed input, multiple lines to enter granular data)

T&E Planning - Admin App

Apps have been set up to define the used travel routes and input the global and route-specific rates. Access the new administrative apps in Apliqo Settings → Travel.

Data integration improvements

The menu has changed and the data load configuration apps have been combined. Under Apliqo Settings there is a new menu entry Data Integration, under which you will find the new app “Data Processing”. The first step “Actuals” allows you to:

• Clear data from Trial Balance and General Ledger cube

• Upload data from Excel

• Execute data load processes

• Review the trial balance data as well as the general ledger cube.

The functionality of the former “Data Load Configuration” is reflected in the new subscreen “Automation” of the Data Processing app. There are a number of changes:

• The configurations have been grouped into “Templates”, which are predefined in the FPM base model, and “Used”, which are your own configurations.

• The step setup moved into a popup, the steps are now grouped in “System” and “Custom”, the later containing any of your custom data load steps.

• The UI has been updated.

For detailed instructions please refer to the documentation.

Debit-Credit Shift

A new process and step have been added to the data processing to automatically post adjustments for negative closing balances on certain accounts. Typically use cases are bank accounts, receivables etc. that should normally have a positive closing balance but can in some months have a negative balance, e.g. because a bank account is overdrawn in a period and is now a liability rather than an asset. The feature has to be activated for each account it should be used for by specifying the account that a negative balance should be “transferred” to. You might have an account “1130 - Accounts receivable trade - Intercompany” and if the closing balance is -50k (this could be the case if an intercompany partner has overpaid) you would like to show +50k as the closing balance account “2130 - Accounts payable trade - Intercompany” instead. If you don’t have a suitable account already, the system will assist you to create one. Once the accounts are flagged / created, you can execute the debit-credit shift process. In most cases you would add this feature to an already existing data processing automation, so that the adjustment can take place with each data load.

Chart of account maintenance improvements

The chart of account maintenance app has been further improved.

» Account Info / Highlighting

All accounts are now displayed with additional information. Fixed accounts (e.g. C3_TOTASSETS - Total Assets) are highlighted with a label. You also see the number of parents that an element of your CoA is assigned to and the weight is indicated by color (green = positive, red = negative, grey = zero). This makes reconciliation easier. You can use the generated attribute “AccountInfo” in your reports as well.

» Row Format

Maintaining attribute driven row formatting on the chart of accounts dimension for reporting purposes is easier now. Simply create additional attributes and assign them to the the attribute group “Row Format”. You can now define already existing or newly created CSS classes to the elements in the CoA dimension. All format attributes will be displayed as a filter selection and you will see the preview of the selected format attribute reflected in the table.

» Upload Rollups

You can now upload your CoA rollups prepared in Excel in the Rollups popup. Display the content of a rollup and use the upload button to expose the upload form. You can also download a previously loaded rollup.

» Backup

You can now backup or restore a state of your chart of accounts at any time. This could be useful if you are working on your CoA structure or mappings extensively and would like to preserve a copy in case you need to restore the structure to a previous state. The backup covers the entire structure, attributes, plan account mapping and KPIs.

» Automation

The automation section of the CoA maintenance as such is not a new feature but you can now execute all active automation steps conveniently from the Operational CoA section.

This allows you to pre-configure the steps that should typically be updated. The above screenshot shows a typical scenario, in which the operational chart of accounts is maintained manually and the automation will:

• Update system attributes in OCoA

• Update the PCoA according to the mappings in place, i.e. if you created a new account it will be created in the planning chart of accounts as well

• Update system attributes in PCoA

• Synchronise OCoA

• Synchronise PCoA

» Localisation of Fixed Accounts and KPI

Any localised Description attributes that are created in your chart of accounts dimension will now automatically also appear as additional columns in the Fixed Accounts and the KPI section. Please maintain any translations there.

Currency conversion - Daily rates API integration

Daily currency conversion rates can now be loaded into the system. Missing rates for non-trading days will automatically be filled with the last available rate. The system calculates the monthly average and closing rates (last day of the month), which can then be used for the monthly currency conversion. Two currency providers have been integrated so far:

• European Central Bank: No additional setup needed

• Alpha Vantage: An access key is required, please refer to the documentation

All Issues resolved in Release