CUBS Budget:Other and Other:XXXX confusion

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gpolson
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CUBS Budget:Other and Other:XXXX confusion

#1

Post by gpolson »

A suggestion to the programmers - how about changing the name of the CUBS "Budget:Other" subcategory to "Budget:More"

Several units are currently re-creating their own subcategories under "Budget:Other" for things like combined YM/YW activities that are not represented in the standard list of budget accounts created by CUBS.

If "Budget:Other" was renamed to "Budget:More" then "More" would just be a heading with the locally unique budget accounts listed under it. "More" would in essence mean more subcategories.

The current use of the word "OTHER" in "Budget:Other" immediately creates confusion with our longstanding "OTHER" category which has subcategories under it for holding funds that have been collected for special events and projects.

That confusion is enhanced in some of the drop down lists that don't have deep indentations for subcategories. Its hard to tell which "Other" to pick. You see it as "Other" under the exploded budget category list AND again further below.

Having two uses of the word "OTHER" in the list of accounts is just asking for problems. I have already made the mistake of creating a few subcategories under "Budget:Other" that really belonged under our old Other category (CUBS first called it Other:Payable to Local Unit), and I have been at this for several decades.

This morning I see the "Payable to Local Unit" category that was holding our old "OTHER" accounts in the new CUBS system has now been renamed to "Authorized Member Financed Activities".

Lets hop on the rename it band wagon and rename "Budget:Other" to "Budget:More" or "Budget:WhateverElseTheyWantToCallIt" so we can create our locally unique budget subcategories under it and not get them confused with the longstanding "Other" accounts.

Thanks for listening.

chartman
russellhltn
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#2

Post by russellhltn »

Personally, I think Budget:Misc would be better. I agree that two "Others" is asking for trouble.

Although renaming the old "Other" to "Authorized Member Financed Activities" might clear up some misunderstandings of what it was to be used for.
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ralitaco
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#3

Post by ralitaco »

All those in favor of "Budget:Misc" Please make it manifest
ecotim
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#4

Post by ecotim »

ralitaco wrote:All those in favor of "Budget:Misc" Please make it manifest
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gpolson
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#5

Post by gpolson »

I thought about "Misc" earlier, but locally, we have long had a Budget:Misc category for miscellaneous items. It was historically a parallel category to our "Budget:Young Men", "Budget Relief Society", etc. categories.

In the new CUBS system we have it under the "Budget:Other" category at the moment, listed as "Budget:Other:Misc".

If you turned "Budget:Other" into "Budget:Misc" we (and I suspect many others like us) would then have "Budget:Misc", a "Budget:Misc:Combined Youth Activities", and a "Budget:Misc:Misc". While we could put the truly misc items in the top "Budget:Misc" and the sub guys under there in the appropriate subcategory, our old training on keeping the top category of the old "Other" account empty keeps bleeding over making it hard for me to put things in a top "Budget:Misc" then still put stuff in "Budget:Misc:Combined Youth Activities" in a subcategory under it.

The double use of "Misc" would create the same problem we are trying to avoid. Some people would be dropping misc. items in both of them ("Budget:Misc" and "Budget:Misc:Misc". )

The current "Budget:Other" category is not really a miscellaneous category. The way we and many others are using it, it is just a place to access some more subcategories that were not among the standard categories created by CUBS.

I looked at a dictionary and a synonym finder before suggesting "Budget:More". I am not real big on "more" but it seemed more appropriate and less likely to cause confusion that the alternatives, plus it is a short word.


While we are at it, I am guessing CUBS may eventually go to some abbreviations / acronyms for "Authorized Member Financed Activities" and other similar new categories with very long names because the current full names make it hard to pick out the correct trailing subcategories in drop down lists (you see many items in a row with a lot of the same letters vs a shorter group of similar letters - see below)

"Authorized Member Financed Activities:Girls Camp"
"Authorized Member Financed Activities:Nauvoo Trip"
"Authorized Member Financed Activities:RS Craft Blitz"
"Authorized Member Financed Activities:Scouts Flag Project"

would become:

AMFA:Girls Camp
AMFA:Nauvoo Trip
AMFA:RS Craft Blitz
AMFA:Scout Flag Project

and much easier to select from.

thanks for listening again
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aebrown
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#6

Post by aebrown »

ralitaco wrote:All those in favor of "Budget:Misc" Please make it manifest
chartman wrote:I looked at a dictionary and a synonym finder before suggesting "Budget:More". I am not real big on "more" but it seemed more appropriate and less likely to cause confusion that the alternatives, plus it is a short word.
I like More better than Misc.

The subcategories we are talking about just happen not to be built-in categories. But they're not really miscellaneous -- they are simply more categories beyond the built-in categories. So I like "More".
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russellhltn
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#7

Post by russellhltn »

Alan_Brown wrote:I like More better than Misc.

The subcategories we are talking about just happen not to be built-in categories. But they're not really miscellaneous -- they are simply more categories beyond the built-in categories. So I like "More".
The problem I have with "more" is that it seems like a oxymoron - more money/more budget.

"Other" is the most appropriate term. And if the top level "Other" is getting renamed to AMFA, that would probably be best. However, it would cause quite a confusion during the change-over, especially with older posts and guidelines.

Part of me wonders if this is a preview of the CHI training.
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aebrown
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#8

Post by aebrown »

RussellHltn wrote:"Other" is the most appropriate term. And if the top level "Other" is getting renamed to AMFA, that would probably be best. However, it would cause quite a confusion during the change-over, especially with older posts and guidelines.
I agree that "Budget:Other" is the most appropriate term. But it does create potential confusion, so that's why I can go along with a proposal to change it.

Note, however, that the top level "Other" is not getting renamed to AMFA. "Other" is still the top level, but there is a new second level. That second level was called "Other:Payable to Local Unit" in the initial CUBS transition, and now it is "Other:Authorized Member Financed Activities". Either way, it's still a subcategory of "Other".
RussellHltn wrote:Part of me wonders if this is a preview of the CHI training.
I think the CHI training will have to be rather broad in content, since so many different people are involved. I wouldn't anticipate any significant discussion of financial issues. But we will all know soon enough....
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gregwanderson
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#9

Post by gregwanderson »

This, to me, is another example of something that did NOT need to change but was included anyway in this latest, comprehsensive re-write of the financial portion of MLS. Why restrict our ability to create sub-categories of the budget? We'll just end up creating the same sub-categories we had before but we'll be forced to put them into places where they won't fit as neatly. Another example of a mess caused because too much was changed all at once. I can say "if it ain't broke" etc. Someone back in HQ will argue that this stuff DID need to be fixed but, out here on the ground, we can't understand why.
gpolson
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#10

Post by gpolson »

I considered "more" might seem like more money/more budget before I suggested it. However, it still seems like the best choice to me.

I am not sure if the system would support it or not, but one way around the point raised by Bro. RussellHltn is to use "More..." (the three dots signifying that if you click on it you will be led to more categories).

Budget:More...
Budget:More...:Combined Youth Activities
Budget:More...:CUBS PTSD foundation (a little humor)
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