Arlo allows you to record fixed and variable prices for a course, and report on the total cost of the course - allowing you to see whether or not it is profitable.
The following instructions outline how to enable expense management and report on course expenses and performance. You will need to add the expense fields to your platform before completing the reporting, but this step only needs to be completed once while initially setting this reporting up for use.
This step only needs to be completed once, when initially setting up this feature for use.
- Open the Settings menu item.
- From the Platform setup section, select Fields.
- Select Courses.
- Add two single line of text fields to the Active fields section.
- Name the first field Fixed expenses. This field will be used to capture fixed course expenses such as presenters, venue. Name the second field Variable expenses. This field will be used to capture variable expenses per registrant such as training materials, catering etc.
- The fields will be added to the platform immediately and should appear as per below.
- When creating a new course, or editing an existing course you can record expenses against the course on the Schedule tab of the Course Wizard.
- Open the Reports menu.
- Select Course List (Advanced).
- Add conditions to return the courses with expenses you would like to report on.
- Include the following fields in your report output in this order:
- Course Name
- Start Date
- Fixed Expenses
- Variable Expenses
- Additional Expenses (if included).
- Current Registration Count (This will only pull through approved registrations).
- Press Preview to display the results.
- Press Export. You can now calculate the total expenses for the course using a formula in excel.
- The formula to use is Fixed Expenses + (Variable Expenses * Registrations).
- In cell F2 enter the formula '=(C2+(D2*E2))' and press enter - This will calculate the total cost of each course.
If you are also using a column for additional costs, you'll need to use column G and use this formula instead '=(C2+E2+(D2*F2))'
- Drag the expense formula down the column list. You now have the total expense for each course (see example below).
- For the same courses, run the Course Performance report.
- Ensure that the Total - orders less credits (Value) is selected as an output.
This field does not take into consideration order discounts applied to orders made with the course, as order discounts can be applied to orders with multiple registrations and multiple courses.
- Compare the value of orders earned against the expenses of the course to establish profitability.
Example: The course below was not profitable, as the costs were $835, yet it only generated $700 in paid orders.
