Why Can't I Activate This Budget?
If the Activate or Save and activate button is disabled, or activation fails with a message, one of a few common conditions is blocking it. This article walks through each one and how to resolve it....
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If the Activate or Save and activate button is disabled, or activation fails with a message, one of a few common conditions is blocking it. This article walks through each one and how to resolve it.
The budget is empty
A budget with no categories and no accounts added cannot be activated. One category or one account, anywhere in the budget, is enough. You do not need one in Revenue and another in Expense.
Amounts are never what blocks activation. A line deliberately budgeted at zero is a real figure and is perfectly acceptable, and so is a negative one. Only an empty structure stops you.
Fix: Go back into the editor and add at least one group (Add group) or one standalone account (Add single account). See How to create a budget and How to create groups for the steps.
Scenarios have not finished loading
Activation waits for the scenario list, because a budget must never go live without URBI knowing which scenario, if any, it was activated on. Two messages come from this:
- "Scenarios are still loading. Try activating again when they are ready." Give it a moment and click Activate again.
- "Scenarios could not be loaded. Retry loading them before activating." Reload the page so the list can load, then activate.
Fix: In both cases, wait or reload and try again. Nothing is wrong with the budget itself.
Another budget is already active for this fiscal year
Only one budget can be Active per fiscal year. If a different budget is already Active for the same year, the Activate button on your Draft is disabled with an explanatory tooltip, and attempting to activate from the editor shows a banner naming the conflicting budget.
Fix: Archive the current Active budget first (see Archiving Budgets and the Archived Section), then activate your Draft. Or see How to make a new budget when one is already active for the full walkthrough.
The fiscal year isn't configured
If your property's fiscal year settings haven't been set up yet, the editor shows a banner explaining that the fiscal year isn't configured, and both Save and Activate are disabled until it is.
Fix: Click Configure fiscal year on the banner to jump to Accounting Settings, set the fiscal year start, then return to the budget and try again.
Income and expense don't match
This one is not a hard block, it is an advisory. If your total budgeted income and total budgeted expense are not equal, a dialog names the direction of the gap, Income exceeds expense or Expense exceeds income, and tells you by how much. It adds: "You can still activate, but review the gap first."
You then choose Go back and fix, or Activate anyway to go live with the gap and track it on the performance view.
Still stuck?
If none of the above applies and activation still won't go through, check Troubleshooting: Saving a Budget - activation always saves first, so a save-time issue can surface as an activation failure. Contact URBI at hello@myurbi.co if the problem persists.