How costs are split across lots

Some costs belong to a single lot - a bag of starter feed fed to one broiler batch. Many do not. An electricity bill, a delivery charge, or a vet visit often covers several lots at once. Allocation is how PoultryDesk turns one shared expense into a fair per-lot share, so every lot's profit reflects its true costs.

There is one allocation engine and one set of methods. Every expense that is split goes through the same path, so the numbers are consistent and always add up to the original amount to the cent.

Allocation methods

When you allocate an expense you choose how it should be split:

• Direct - the whole expense belongs to one lot. Nothing is split.
• Equal split - divided evenly across the chosen lots.
• By bird count - split in proportion to how many birds each lot has. A lot with twice the birds carries twice the share.
• By bird-days - split by flock size over time. Good for labour, rent, and utilities across Lots that were present for different parts of a period.
• By feed used - split from the effective Actual and Estimated Feed kg in the chosen window. The default is the seven Organization days ending on the allocation date. Good for costs that scale with intake.
• By house area - split in proportion to the floor area each lot occupies. Good for rent, heating, and lighting.
• By revenue - split in proportion to each Lot's recorded revenue.
• By production - split in proportion to recorded production, such as eggs collected.
• Custom ratio - you set the ratio between lots yourself.
• Manual - you type each lot's exact amount.

Whatever method you pick, PoultryDesk uses fair rounding so the split always sums back to the original total - no stray cents left over.

For By feed used, PoultryDesk freezes the exact date window and per-Lot Feed kg on the new allocation. Later Feed capture, correction, or backfill can change a future allocation, but it never rewrites the prior split. If every selected Lot has zero effective Feed in the window, PoultryDesk rejects the allocation as No Feed basis instead of recording a false completed split.

Allocating an expense

1. Open the expense under Finance > Sales & expenses > Expenses and choose Re-allocate. With no current allocation, this opens Allocate expense.
2. Choose the Lots it covers and the method. For a typed direct Feed purchase, review Feed phase guidance before confirming the split.
3. Review and confirm. The split is recorded and each Lot's financial summary updates after sync. A first allocation does not need a prior split.

For outstanding direct Feed purchases, Finance > Profitability > Cost of goods also has an Unallocated feed cost queue. Choose Review unallocated purchases, then Allocate beside the expense. This queue is Organization-wide and is hidden when you search for a particular Lot. The action requires Finance write permission; read-only viewers see View expense instead.

Feed phase guidance

Typed direct Feed purchases retain their selected product and stage. The allocation screen compares this with the target Lot's estimated phase, using placement and recorded eggs rather than its phase today. Layer guidance uses Starter before day 56, then Grower until the first recorded positive egg day; if no egg evidence exists, day 126 is the estimated Layer boundary. Broiler guidance uses day 21 and day 35 boundaries. These are review aids, not breed-specific feeding instructions.

A Proportional - feed reallocation uses the original frozen Feed window. Other methods use the expense date. A crossing window is Mixed phases. Unknown product or lifecycle facts stay Unknown rather than being guessed. Mismatch warnings never silently exclude Lots or change amounts.

Save a rule for next time

If you split the same kind of cost the same way every month, save your choice as an allocation rule - for example "always split vet bills by bird count" or "always split the electricity bill by house area". Next time a matching expense arrives, PoultryDesk applies the rule automatically, so it never lands in the worklist.

Decide the cost path once, not on every receipt

A rule also states the cost path for the purchases it matches - how the money reaches your lots:

• Allocated at expense time. The purchase is charged to lots straight away, split by the rule's method. Use this for costs you do not hold as stock.
• Stocked, then average cost when consumed. The purchase is held as stock and charged to lots at its average cost as it is used. A rule on this path names no method and no lots, because the lots are decided later by what actually gets used.

Setting the path on the rule means every matching purchase is recorded the same way, whoever captures it, so your month-to-month figures stay comparable. The expense form then applies your rule instead of asking again: a stocked rule asks only for the item and quantity, and a rule that charges the cost straight away hides the stock fields entirely and asks for the lots instead.

To change how a category is treated, edit its rule. That keeps the decision in one reviewable place rather than spread across individual receipts. Until you set a path, the expense form keeps asking whoever records the purchase, and a Feed purchase recorded outside the stock path still asks for a short reason.

Which lots a rule uses

Each rule also decides which lots a recognized cost lands on:

• The lots on the transaction - whoever records it picks the lots, and the rule only sets the split method. This is how the starter rules ship.
• Every active lot - worked out fresh on the transaction date, so a lot placed next month is included automatically. Use it for shared costs like rent or electricity.
• Specific lots - always the same lots. Add them from the picker; a lot that has since closed stays listed until you remove it.

For Custom ratio and Manual, enter each lot's share or amount on its own row in the list.

Rules live under Finance > Setup > Allocation rules.

Lots a sale or expense can reach

A cost or a sale only reaches lots that were running on its transaction date - placed by then, and not closed by then. Back-date a record and the list changes to the lots that were running at the time, so historical entries stay accurate. Picking a lot that could not have carried the money on that date is refused with an explanation rather than quietly dropped.

Changing an allocation

If you split an expense wrongly, you re-allocate it. PoultryDesk records the new split as a fresh allocation that supersedes the old one - the previous split stays in the history rather than being overwritten. Re-running an allocation always produces the same result from the same inputs, so the books stay auditable.

See also

• Recording sales and expenses
• Invoices and payments