It is always important to have a clear picture of financial plans, both income and expenditure. The Financial Regulations state that “Heads of Institutions are authorised to incur expenditure not exceeding the limits of funds available to the Institution. They are responsible for ensuring that monitoring and control arrangements are adequate to prevent over-commitment of expenditure”. In effect this is saying that expenditure should not exceed income, or where relevant, allocated budget.
Ideally income and expenditure should be matched against each other in the same financial year, but this is not always possible due to timing differences. Where appropriate this gives rise to the need for accruals and pre-payments. Refer to FPM Chapter 11, Year-end instructions.