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The short answer: Functional expense allocation means assigning every expense to the function it supports: program services, management and general, or fundraising. Charge costs directly when they clearly belong to one function. Split shared costs, such as an executive director's salary, rent or IT, using a reasonable, documented basis like time records, square footage or headcount. GAAP requires every nonprofit to present expenses by both function and nature and to disclose

The short answer: A WIP (work-in-progress) schedule lists every open construction job with its contract value, estimated total cost, cost to date and billings to date. From those, it calculates percent complete (cost to date ÷ estimated total cost), earned revenue (percent complete × contract value), and whether each job is overbilled (billed more than earned, which is a liability) or underbilled (earned more than billed, which is an asset). It's the report that turns your jo

The short answer: Restricted funds are gifts a donor has limited to a specific purpose or time period. Under GAAP they're reported as net assets with donor restrictions. Unrestricted funds have no donor-imposed limits and are reported as net assets without donor restrictions. When you meet the restriction (you run the program, the time passes, or the asset is placed in service), you record a release: an entry that moves the amount from "with" to "without" donor restrictions.

The short answer: Job costing for contractors means tracking the labor, materials, subcontractors and equipment on each job against that job's budget, using job numbers and cost codes, so you can see whether a job is making money while it's still running. To do it well, you need three things that most setups skip: a fully burdened labor rate, open commitments (POs and subcontracts) in the report, and a forecast of the cost to finish that gets updated every week or two. If you