Dynamics 365 Business Central makes use of a feature called Business Intelligence to assist end-users in data analysis and reporting. This works largely with the help of dimensions. Dimensions in Business Central are custom attributes that can be assigned to a variety of different entry records. These dimensions can then be grouped by similarities such as a region or product and with reporting via account schedules.

Business Intelligence accomplishes a variety of tasks including:

Comparing actual versus budgeted amounts

Establishing KPIs and analyzing financial performance

Set up analysis views using dimensions

Create analysis reports for sales, purchases, and inventory

Budget versus actual amount analysis

Analyzing budgeted versus actual amounts makes use of G/L Budgets. These budgets can be seen by entering G/L Budgets in the search function. After opening the desired budget, there are filter fields at the top that allow for the definition of which data is shown.

These actual and budgeted amounts can be viewed for all accounts by navigating to the Chart of Accounts page and selecting the G/L Balance/Budget action. This will also have the same fields at the top that allow for data to be defined. The columns on the left will display the chart of accounts. On the right are columns showing the actual and budgeted amounts for each account as well as a column with the relationship between these amounts on the general ledger. Back on the Chart of Accounts page, actual versus budgeted amounts can be viewed for multiple periods via the G/L Account Balance/Budget function.

Financial reporting with account schedules

Account schedules are used to help generate insights into the pieces of financial data stored within the chart of accounts. They analyze data within G/L accounts and compare entries on the general ledger with general ledger budgets. There are a few default account schedules that come with Business Central, but new columns and rows can bet created to provide more customization and serve different functions like calculating profit margins by department.

Account schedules are used to create arrangements of accounts from the chart of accounts that present data in an easy to read manner. These schedules also perform calculations that are not able to be made directly within the chart of accounts. Account schedules can create subtotals for groups to be included in a new total. By comparing account schedules, new schedules and financial reports can be created. The Account Schedule KPI web Service Setup page can be used to create KPIs and assigned to account schedules to feed data into the Web Services page.

Analyzing by dimensions

Dimensions are data markers that can be added to entries to better group entries that possesses similar characteristics like regions or products. They can be used on a variety of different entry types such as journals, budgets, and documents. They can be used for basic comparisons such as sales per area, but can be stacked to give a more in-depth analysis of multiple characteristics. Analyzing by dimensions is done through the Analysis Views page of Business Central. When opening an analysis view, there is an Analysis by Dimensions function. After applying the desired filters and dimensions, the left columns will contain the information defined by the Show as Lines field. The right columns will have the data from the Show as Columns field.

Creating analysis reports

Analysis reports assist in the creation of customized reports on the records of transactions. They can be personalized to focus on key accounts to examine things like profits, sales, and turnover to then compare with previous months or years and calculate differences. This is all done within the same view and gives the ability to easily jump to areas that are posing problems. There are a few analysis report templates that come with Business Central, but they can be further customized to fit each business’ individual needs.

To learn more about Dynamics 365 Business Central’s business intelligence capabilities, and how they could help your organization, get in contact with one of our consultants!