In the first part of this tutorial, we discussed how custom reports in Intacct can be used. We also went over the beginning steps to create your own custom report. This next section will go over the different calculation, sorting, and filtering options that are available.

The fourth step of the custom reports wizard is where you can add calculated columns. Each column can be customized with different formulas and column names. To create a new calculation, simply click “Add”. This will bring up a form where you can see the available data columns and operators. Any of the available columns or operators can be added by clicking on them. You can also type your desired formula directly into the Formula box. Once your formula is ready, select the type of data the column should display as (decimal, currency, or percentage), give the column a name, and save it. To add more columns, just repeat the process. Once you’re done, move on to the next step.

Next is column sorting. Here you can decide how columns are sorted – either ascending or descending order – and the sort priority. To change the sort order for a column, just choose the appropriate order in the dropdown menu. Note that only four columns maximum may be assigned a sort order. Now to change the sort priority of columns, click and drag that column’s row up or down the list. The column in the first position will be sorted first, the second position sorted next, etc. Once finished, move on to the next step.

The next section is where we can filter the data in the report. The filters can be set against any data related to the root object chosen earlier, not just the data displayed in your report. Also note that filtering by date is done when running the report, and thus will not be setup at this time. To add a new filter, find the object you want to put a filter on, choose the filter type, and put in the filter value. For example, if you want to only show invoices that are still unpaid, you might filter “Amount Due” by “greater than 0.00”. If you need to filter records that have an empty value, the keyword “null” can be used. Basic filters are evaluated as AND statements by default, but that can be changed in the next step.

After you set up your basic filters, you can change how they are evaluated in the Advanced Filters step. Here, you can use AND, OR, and parentheses to set filter conditions. Expressions inside of parentheses are evaluated first, so if your advanced filter was “(1 AND 2) OR 3”, then 3 would be returned only if “1 AND 2” did not have a result.

Next week in Part 3 of this tutorial, we will look at grouping, charts, and run-time parameters.