Reporting Overview

What is this page about: Light's reporting engine generates financial statements, custom reports, and pivot tables directly from your ledger. This page explains the four core financial statements, the three report types you can build, how to navigate to and create reports, what filters are available, how exporting and drilldown work, how multi-entity and multi-currency reporting work, and what the Home dashboard shows.

# On this page

• What financial statements are included?
• What types of reports can I create?
• How do I navigate to my reports?
• How do I create a report?
• What filters can I apply to a report?
• How do I export a report?
• How does drilldown work?
• How does multi-entity consolidation work?
• How does multi-currency reporting work?
• What does the Home dashboard show?

# What financial statements are included?

Four pre-built, system-generated financial statements are included:

• Balance Sheet: shows financial position at a point in time, covering assets (what's owned), liabilities (what's owed), and equity (owners' stake).
• Income Statement (P&L): shows financial performance over a period, covering revenues earned, expenses incurred, and resulting profit or loss.
• Cash Flow Statement: shows how cash moved across operating, investing, and financing activities over a period.
• Trial Balance: lists all general ledger (GL) accounts and their debit/credit balances, used to verify posting accuracy.

Beyond these four, there's also a General Ledger system report and country-specific VAT return reports (currently for Denmark, the UK, Sweden, and Switzerland).

All system reports are read-only: they cannot be edited or deleted.

# What types of reports can I create?

Three report types are supported:

• Table: a custom report template built with a formula-based row and column structure. Define up to 5 columns (labeled A through E) with editable labels, and build rows using formula references and tax tags. Rows can be hierarchical (parent/child). This is the format used by all system financial statements.
• Pivot table: a flexible cross-tabulation of ledger data. Choose dimensions (rows and columns) and a measure (transaction amount, local amount, or group amount), then apply filters. Best for ad hoc analysis across entities, accounts, currencies, business partners, and custom properties.
• Text to chart: generates a report from a plain-language prompt. Describe what you want to see, and Light produces a structured table or chart from your ledger data.

# How do I navigate to my reports?

Go to Planning & Reports → Reports to see the full report list.

The list shows Name, Type, and Last updated for each report. Click any row to open it.

Each row has a menu (⋮) with three actions:

• Link: copies the report URL to your clipboard for sharing.
• Duplicate: creates a copy (available for Table and Pivot table types).
• Delete: permanently removes the report (custom reports only; system reports cannot be deleted).

# How do I create a report?

1. Navigate to Planning & Reports → Reports.

2. Click + Create report.

3. Choose a type from the dropdown:

   • Pivot table: opens the pivot table builder.
   • Table: opens the report template editor.
   • Text to chart: opens the Text to chart assistant, where you describe the report you want.

# What filters can I apply to a report?

When viewing any report, you can control what data is shown using these filters:

• Entity: select a single entity, multiple entities, or switch to Consolidated view, which combines all selected entities and shows subtotals, eliminations, and a consolidated total.
• Date range: select start and end dates. Snapshot reports (e.g. the Balance Sheet) use a single as-of date instead of a range.
• Currency: choose between Entity Crcy (each entity in its own functional currency) and Group Crcy (all entities translated to the group currency). If multiple entities with different currencies are selected, choosing Entity Crcy shows an error ("Selected entities have different currencies") rather than being applied.
• Comparison: add a prior period or prior year alongside the current period, either 1, 3, 6, 9, or 12 months back, or 1, 2, or 3 years back.
• Custom properties: filter report data by any custom property values configured in your organisation.

# How do I export a report?

Reports can be exported as CSV. Click the export button on any report to download a CSV file.

• Period reports are named {reportName}_{startDate}_to_{endDate}.csv.
• Snapshot reports (e.g. the Balance Sheet) are named {reportName}_as_of_{date}.csv.
• {reportName} is sanitized in the filename: special characters are stripped and spaces become underscores.

The exported CSV includes all rows and columns as displayed, respecting your organisation's CSV separator setting. You can open the file in Excel, Google Sheets, or import it into a BI tool for further analysis and presentation.

# How does drilldown work?

Click any cell value in a report to drill into the underlying ledger transactions. The drilldown view shows the individual postings that make up that figure, and can be filtered by posting date, currency, amount, document type, and entity. Drilldown results can also be exported as CSV.

For aged AP (accounts payable) and aged AR (accounts receivable) reports, the drilldown shows invoices grouped by due date ranges.

# How does multi-entity consolidation work?

Select multiple entities and switch to Consolidated view to see:

• A column per entity.
• A Subtotal column (sum of all entities).
• An Eliminations column (intercompany offsets).
• A Consolidated column (the final consolidated result).

Entity columns can be reordered by dragging.

# How does multi-currency reporting work?

Every report supports two currency views:

• Entity Crcy: each entity in its own functional currency, useful for entity-level review.
• Group Crcy: all entities translated to the group currency, required for consolidation.

# What does the Home dashboard show?

The Home page (/dashboard) provides a summary view with fixed widgets showing bank account and card balances, pending tasks, and top vendors by spend. This is a read-only overview and is not customisable.

# Frequently Asked Questions

# How many columns can a Table report have?

Up to 5 columns, labeled A through E.

# Is "Text to chart" still in beta?

No. It's a fully released feature and doesn't carry a beta label.

# What happens if Entity Crcy is selected for entities with different currencies?

An error message appears ("Selected entities have different currencies") rather than the filter being applied.

# What's the difference between the Subtotal, Eliminations, and Consolidated columns?

Subtotal is the sum across all selected entities before adjustments. Eliminations shows intercompany offsets. Consolidated is the final result after eliminations are applied.

# What format are exported report filenames in?

Period reports use {reportName}_{startDate}_to_{endDate}.csv. Snapshot reports use {reportName}_as_of_{date}.csv. The report name is sanitized (special characters removed, spaces replaced with underscores).

# Can a system report like the Balance Sheet be deleted?

No. System reports are read-only and cannot be edited or deleted. Only custom reports (Table and Pivot table types) can be deleted.

# Who can create a new report?

Only users with permission to create reports see the + Create report button. Users with view-only access can still see and open existing reports, but won't see the option to create new ones.

# Related articles

• Balance sheet
• Profit and loss
• Cash flow statement
• Trial balance
• Tables and pivot reports
• Multi-entity consolidation
• Custom reports and filters
• Budget scenarios