---
name: al-453-find-out-why-you-missed-budget-not-just-by-how-much-have
description: "On Oct 29, 2026 Microsoft added 25 finance skills and partner plugins to Copilot in Excel and Cowork through its Frontier programme, reported by Accountio. One of them compares actual results with budgets, forecasts or prior periods and explains the differences by price, volume, mix, rate or timing; others build forecasts from actuals, run reconciliations and prepare tax and audit workpapers for review. The wording puts sign-off with the accountant. The prompt below does a price, volume and mix explanation of your own numbers in any AI assistant. Use when the user wants help with budget variance analysis (finance) for a small business."
---

# Find out why you missed budget, not just by how much: have an AI compare actuals to budget and last year, and split every big gap into price, volume, mix and timing, with the follow-up questions for each owner

On Oct 29, 2026 Microsoft added 25 finance skills and partner plugins to Copilot in Excel and Cowork through its Frontier programme, reported by Accountio. One of them compares actual results with budgets, forecasts or prior periods and explains the differences by price, volume, mix, rate or timing; others build forecasts from actuals, run reconciliations and prepare tax and audit workpapers for review. The wording puts sign-off with the accountant. The prompt below does a price, volume and mix explanation of your own numbers in any AI assistant.

## Inputs to collect first
Ask the user for anything below that they haven't already given you. Don't guess missing facts.

- Month or quarter
- Product / service line / location
- Table
- Threshold, e.g. 5% or $2,000
- CHECK

## Instructions

Do the task below with the user's inputs in place of each [bracket].

Act as my financial analyst. Here are my numbers for [month or quarter]: budget, actual and the same period last year, by [product / service line / location], with units sold and average price where I have them: [paste table]. 1) Show total variance against budget and against last year, in money and %. 2) For each line with a gap over [threshold, e.g. 5% or $2,000], split it into price effect (we charged more or less), volume effect (we sold more or fewer), mix effect (we sold a different blend of products) and timing (revenue or costs that moved between periods), showing the arithmetic. If I'm missing data for a split, say what you'd need and mark the estimate as [CHECK]. 3) Rank the 5 biggest drivers in plain English, one sentence each. 4) For each driver, write the question to ask the person responsible and what evidence would confirm it. 5) Suggest whether the forecast for the rest of the year should change, and by roughly how much. Do not invent numbers that aren't in my table.

## Safety checks (share these with the user)

- Check every figure, price and total against your own records before anything is sent, posted or booked. A person approves refunds, discounts, payments and price changes.
- Read and edit the draft before it reaches a customer or goes public. If you later automate this prompt, start with "draft and notify me", not "send automatically".
- Check names, dates, numbers and any claim against your own source material before you use the answer. AI can misread or invent details.
- Say clearly which parts need a person to review or approve before anything is sent, paid, posted or filed.

## About this skill

- Works with: Microsoft Copilot in Excel, Claude, ChatGPT, Excel, Google Sheets
- Based on this real-world example: https://accountio.co.uk/news/microsoft-copilot-for-accountants-finance-skills/
- Free prompt from AgentPlaybook Real Estate: https://agentic-library.netlify.app/prompt/al-453-find-out-why-you-missed-budget-not-just-by-how-much-have-an/
- To install in an agent that supports Agent Skills, save this file as SKILL.md in a folder with the same name as `name` above (for example in your skills directory). Install steps for Claude.ai, Claude Code, Cursor and Codex: https://agentic-library.netlify.app/skills/