The Five Week Month?

castlekeeper_2

I expect there is an easy answer to this, but how do you allow in a spreadsheet budget for months that have five weeks? If you make a budget i.e for 12 months it gets out of shape when there is an extra week/or part week in the month.

Regards

knightstyle

I think this is why some councils and Government depts. use 13 months for accounting each 4 weeks long.

property.advert

Months don't ever have 5 weeks.

You need to do your budget monthly, not weekly, or you need to understand that idea of accrual or prepayment. Essentially, if you don't run your main account into the ground every month then the 5 weekend month will not be a problem.

If you spend £200 a month, then you need to have a buffer of up to £200 in your account for the "fifth" week !

getmore4less

I think you mean 5 weekend months

The range of days in a month is 28-31 days so they differ by +- 2 days

izools

If there are weekly payments what I do is multiply the weekly payment by 52 then divide by 12.

So for example I have my salary (Monthly), DLA (Four-weekly) and Disabled working tax credits (weekly)

The Salary goes on the spreadsheet as is
The dla is devided by four, then multiplied by 52, then devided by 12, then put on the spreadsheet
The tax credits are multiplied by 52 then devided by 12, then put on the spreadsheet.

The same goes for groceries - my share of the groceries is aroun £40 per week, so the monthly figure is £173.33 (which I round up to £175)

As others suggest, you should budget monthly, hopefully this will help you to do so

getmore4less

The real trick is to seperate the income from the outgoings they are usualy on different schedules anyway,

A budget is a plan to make sure the total income is bigger than total out.

The timing is cash flow which which is best solved with a buffer.

david_hellier

castlekeeper wrote: »

I expect there is an easy answer to this, but how do you allow in a spreadsheet budget for months that have five weeks? If you make a budget i.e for 12 months it gets out of shape when there is an extra week/or part week in the month.

Regards

As others say, best to budget weekly.
Divide your monthly ancome and expenditure by 4.333333

property.advert

izools wrote: »

If there are weekly payments what I do is multiply the weekly payment by 52 then divide by 12.

So for example I have my salary (Monthly), DLA (Four-weekly) and Disabled working tax credits (weekly)

The Salary goes on the spreadsheet as is
The dla is devided by four, then multiplied by 52, then devided by 12, then put on the spreadsheet
The tax credits are multiplied by 52 then devided by 12, then put on the spreadsheet.

The same goes for groceries - my share of the groceries is aroun £40 per week, so the monthly figure is £173.33 (which I round up to £175)

As others suggest, you should budget monthly, hopefully this will help you to do so

But you just cannot do this if starting from a balance of zero in a month with an income of 1/12th of the annual total but five weekly payments.

In your example, £40 per week, spent on a Saturday would equate to £200 in a 5 Saturday month, but you would only have £173.33 in the bank to cover this.

You would be ok over the year but not if you started on such a month. People need a buffer but so many seem to run on empty or worse.

opinions4u

Budget as if every month has 35 days of spending in it, including 5 weekends.

That way there will always be money left over.