Group budgeting for multi-company groups: the complete guide

This is the guide to budgeting for a group of companies. The posts that follow it in the series, listed below as they are published, take one question each: Zoho Books budgets against actuals, rolling subsidiary budgets into one, and the latest estimate.

What is a group budget?

A group budget is the plan for the group as a whole, expressed in the same statements as the group accounts. It has five parts, and a budget that lacks any one of them is a pile of company budgets, not a group budget.

• Each company’s budget, in its own currency and on its own chart of accounts.
• A common layout: one group chart of accountsGroup chart of accountsOne list of accounts that every company's own accounts are mapped to, so that figures from different companies and systems add up line by line.Open the glossary entry and the same months.
• Translation into the group’s presentation currencyPresentation currencyThe currency in which the group's financial statements are presented.Open the glossary entry at fixed budget rates.
• Eliminations: the sales and balances between the companies, budgeted on both sides and removed.
• Ownership: the share of a partly owned subsidiary’s profit that belongs to outside owners, the non-controlling interestNon-controlling interestThe share of a subsidiary's equity and profit that belongs to owners outside the group.Open the glossary entry.

Budgets are management information. No accounting standard dictates their form, so the rules in this guide are practice, not requirement. The structure only has to mirror the group accounts so that a variance means something.

Why is a group budget harder than a company budget?

Because the companies disagree about everything except the year. One keeps months across, another one row per month. One budgets in dirhams, another in dollars. One includes sales to a sister company; its sister forgot. And each company’s finance lead has a different opinion about how far to trust the number.

Take Zenvara Group Ltd, the example group used across these guides. Its revenue budget for the calendar year 2027, with each company’s figure in its own currency, translated at budget rates set from the 30 September 2026 closing rates, looks like this.

ZenvaraGBP 7,800,000	7,800,000
FernhollowUSD 5,900,000 at 0.7560	4,460,400
PalmridgeAED 61,000,000 at 0.2040	12,444,000
KestrelwickSGD 3,800,000 at 0.5870	2,230,600
QuillfernEUR 6,400,000 at 0.8470	5,420,800
Revenue before eliminations	32,355,800
Less Zenvara’s services to PalmridgeAED 4,800,000 at 0.2040, budgeted by both companies	(979,200)
Group revenue budget	31,376,600

Example group used across Finconsol guides. The budget figures and budget rates are illustrations. Figures rounded to the pound.

The 979,200 is the point. Zenvara budgets AED 4,800,000 of services to Palmridge, and Palmridge budgets the same amount as a cost. If only one of them does, the group has a difference before the year starts. If neither remembers, group revenue is overstated by the amount.

Free template · Excel

Free: Group budget and latest estimate template

This free Excel template builds a group budget from up to eight companies, each budgeting in its own currency. It translates every budget into the group currency at a budget rate, takes the closed months as actuals, and shows the latest estimate for the year with the variance to budget. An example group is filled in.

• Up to eight companies and twelve months, budgeted in each company's own currency.
• One budget rate for each currency, with the group budget worked out by formula and rounded to whole units.

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How should the companies build their budgets?

The group sets the rules and each company fills in the numbers. Five rules keep the roll-up from becoming a rebuild.

• One template, one chart of accounts. Companies can keep their own accounts in their books, but the budget goes in at group level or is mapped to it.
• Monthly, for twelve months. A quarterly budget cannot be compared with a month of actuals without guessing.
• In the company’s own currency. The company manager can sign off a number they recognise. The group translates it.
• Intercompany lines are marked. Each company names the counterparty so that both sides can be matched.
• One owner and one deadline per company. A late company is chased by name, not by email to the list.

The same approach works if some companies are on Zoho Books and others on QuickBooks, Xero or a spreadsheet, because the budget is a separate file that follows the group layout and not part of any one accounting system.

Which exchange rates should a group budget use?

Fix one set of budget rates when the budget is approved and keep them for the year. Actuals are translated at the actual rates, an average for profit and loss and the closing rate for the balance sheet¹, so the gap between budget and actual then splits into two parts: what the companies did, and what the currencies did.

The split matters because the two have different owners. A Dubai manager who sells 6.7% more than budgeted deserves credit for it, even if the dirham moved against the pound. Without fixed budget rates, the manager and the treasury share one number and neither can read it. A later post in this series works through this with Palmridge and Fernhollow figures.

How are sales between companies and outside owners budgeted?

Both sides budget the same transaction, in the same currency, and the group eliminates it². If they disagree, the group budget carries the difference visibly until one side corrects, just as it would for actuals.

Outside owners come in once the profit is known. Kestrelwick is 80% owned, so 20% of its budgeted profit belongs to the other shareholders and is shown as a separate line, not netted into the group’s own². A group that skips the line will see budgeted profit attributable to the parent come out too high every month.

Who approves a group budget?

Each company’s manager signs off their own figures. The group finance lead reviews the roll-up against the group’s targets. The board approves the group version. Once it is approved, lock that version: a later change becomes a new version with a date and a name, so the board can always see what it approved and what has moved since.

What is the difference between a budget, a forecast and a latest estimate?

The words are used loosely, so state yours. In this series:

• Budget: the plan approved before the year starts. It does not change.
• Latest estimate: the actual months so far plus a fresh estimate for the months that remain. It is the best view of how the year ends.
• Forecast: a projection beyond the current year, or a rolling one that always looks twelve months ahead.

A group usually keeps the budget fixed and reports the latest estimate beside it. The board then sees where it planned to be, where the group now expects to be, and the gap. Changing the budget in July to match the latest estimate removes the one fixed reference the board has.

What does Zoho Books offer a group for budgets?

Checked against Zoho’s help centre on 29 Oct 2026. Zoho Books budgets are documented on a help page³, and the plan comparison lists budgeting on the Premium plan and above and not on Free, Standard or Professional⁴. Plans change, so confirm on the day you buy.

Budget period	Monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or yearly, for a fiscal year
Accounts	Income and expense; asset, liability and equity can be included
Entering amounts	By hand, from the previous year’s actuals, or auto-filled by a fixed amount, adjustment or percentage
Reporting tag	A budget can be created for a specific reporting tag
Budget vs Actuals	Against Profit and Loss, Balance Sheet and Cash Flow, accrual or cash basis
Balancing	A Budget Mismatch Account is added in equity if assets do not equal liabilities plus equity
Currency, and budgets across organizations	The page does not describe either

That is a usable budget for one organization. Zoho’s page does not describe a view across organizations, a budget in several currencies, or a second budget version for the same year. One community thread asks whether a single budget can cover several reporting tags⁵; the thread shows a question, not an answer. A group can still use Zoho Books budgets inside each company and combine them elsewhere.

When does a spreadsheet stop being enough?

A spreadsheet is fine for three small companies with one currency. It starts failing when the number of files exceeds the number of people who understand them. The usual failures are the same ones every month: a company sends a late version, a formula is overwritten, the rate is in one tab and not another, and the version the board saw is not the one in the folder.

The test is simple. Ask who could rebuild the group budget if the person who owns the workbook left tomorrow, and how long it would take.

What does a monthly budget routine look like?

1. Before the year: publish the template, the budget rates and the deadline.
2. Day 5 of each month: actuals are in, mapped and eliminated, as in the group close.
3. Day 6: compare each company’s actuals with budget and with the latest estimate, month and year to date.
4. Day 7: managers explain every variance above the group’s threshold, and the rate effect is shown separately.
5. Quarterly: companies refresh the months that remain, and the group publishes a new latest estimate version.

Where does Finconsol fit?

Finconsol brings each company’s books into the group chart of accounts, translates and eliminates them, and then reads budgets against the same group accounts. It connects to Zoho Books directly, read only, with a nightly refresh. Xero and QuickBooks come in by trial balanceTrial balanceA list of every account balance at a date, with total debits equal to total credits. It is the starting point for consolidating a company's figures.Open the glossary entry upload today, with direct connections coming soon, and any other system comes in by trial balance.

For budgets, a company’s plan can be uploaded as a CSV, wide with months across or long with one row for each line and month, or typed into a grid, and it can be entered per account. A year can hold several versions, original and latest estimate, and one is active for the board. Where there is no group plan, the group budget is the sum of the companies’ plans. Each line then shows actual, budget, variance and variance %, marked ahead or behind, for the month and the year to date.

In FinconsolHow group budgeting works →

Group budget 2027, revenue, GBPv1 active

Company	Local	Rate	GBP
Zenvara	GBP 7,800,000	1.0000	7,800,000
Fernhollow	USD 5,900,000	0.7560	4,460,400
Palmridge	AED 61,000,000	0.2040	12,444,000
Kestrelwick	SGD 3,800,000	0.5870	2,230,600
Quillfern	EUR 6,400,000	0.8470	5,420,800
Eliminated: Zenvara to Palmridge	AED 4,800,000	0.2040	(979,200)
Group revenue budget			31,376,600

Budget columns can also be added to your own report layouts, the board summary and board packs, so the comparison is part of the monthly report and not a separate exercise. The group budget template sets out the layout described above if you want to start in Excel. For the surrounding topics, see the guides on how to consolidate financial statements and currency translation.

In this series

• 29 Oct 2026

  Zoho Books budget vs actual for a group: what works and what does not

  What Zoho's help centre says about budgets and Budget vs Actuals, what it does not describe for a group, and a worked month showing how much of a variance is only the currency.

  Budgeting and forecasting7 min
• 29 Oct 2026

  How to roll up subsidiary budgets into one group budget

  One layout, fixed budget rates, matched intercompany lines and the outside owners' share. A worked first quarter for five companies in four currencies.

  Budgeting and forecasting6 min
• 29 Oct 2026

  Latest estimate, budget or forecast: what a group should report

  Three plans that people use as one word. What each is for, why a group reports the budget and the latest estimate together, and a worked year for five companies.

  Budgeting and forecasting6 min