Event budget tracker

Event budget tracker

Events overspend a few hundred dollars at a time: electrical you forgot, a hotel rate that went up, rush shipping. This kit keeps one CSV of line items and turns it into a clear status: where you are, what is over, and what you owe this week.

When to use

• Planning an event budget, or weekly in the run-up to it.
• "Are we on budget?", "what is due this week?", "how much is left for the dinner?"
• After the event, for the wrap-up: final spend and cost per lead.
• Not for company-wide budgets or accounting entries. This is one event at a time.

Inputs

1. Line items in data/event-budget.csv. Columns: category, item, budget, committed, actual, vendor, paid, due_date.

   • budget: what you planned. committed: what you agreed to pay (a signed quote). actual: what has been invoiced or charged.
   • Amounts can include $ and commas. Dates are YYYY-MM-DD.
   • If the user has a spreadsheet, ask them to export it as CSV, then map their column names (tell them which).
   • Starting from nothing: copy examples/event-budget.csv and replace the rows with theirs. Standard categories: Booth, Shipping, Swag, Travel, Hospitality, Sponsorship, Staffing, Marketing.
2. Total budget (--total), if it differs from the sum of the lines. The difference shows as unallocated.
3. Contingency percent to hold back (--contingency, suggest 10 for a first-time event, 5 for a repeat).
4. Outcomes, if known: attendees, leads, meetings booked. Used for unit costs.

Steps

1. Check the CSV. Every line needs a category and a budget. Flag rows with an amount in actual but no committed (fine, but ask whether more is coming).

2. Run the report.

   node scripts/budget.mjs data/event-budget.csv out --total 52000 --contingency 5 --as-of 2026-11-04 --leads 180

   Forecast per line is the larger of committed and actual, or the budget if nothing is committed yet. The script writes out/event-budget.md and out/event-budget.json.

3. Read the verdict first: on budget, on budget with some categories over, into contingency, or over budget.
4. Explain the overruns in plain words, biggest first, and suggest where the money could come from (a category with room left, unallocated budget, contingency). Do not move money between categories in the file without asking.
5. List bills due in the next 7 days (--due-days to change), overdue first. Lines marked "invoice not logged" are committed but not yet invoiced: ask whether the invoice arrived.
6. Update as you go. When the user says "the dinner came in at 5,800" or "paid the printer", edit that row in data/event-budget.csv, rerun, and show what moved.

Output format

# Event budget (as of 2026-11-04)

**Into contingency.** Forecast $51,460 of $52,000 budget. Remaining $540 (-$2,060 after 5% contingency).

| Category | Budget | Committed | Invoiced | Forecast | Left | Used |
| **OVER** Booth | $28,800 | $30,600 | $23,225 | $30,600 | -$1,800 | 106.3% |

## Lines over budget
## Bills due within 7 days
## Unit costs (forecast)

What I would do: <two or three specific moves, e.g. drop the coffee cart ($1,500 planned, nothing committed) to cover the booth build overrun>

Guardrails

• Never pay, approve, or email anyone. This kit reports; people decide.
• Never change a budget number without the user saying so. Actuals and paid flags are fine to update when the user reports them.
• Keep vendor names and amounts inside data/ and out/. Summarize, do not paste the whole file into chat.
• If amounts look like they are in different currencies, stop and ask; the script assumes one currency.

Event budget tracker

One CSV, one command, and you know where your event budget stands: forecast vs. budget, which categories are over, what you owe this week, and what each lead cost.

Who it is for: event and field marketers, founders running a booth, and anyone who has found out about a budget overrun from the credit card statement.

Example

Input (data/event-budget.csv):

category,item,budget,committed,actual,vendor,paid,due_date
Booth,Booth build and graphics,9000,10450,5225,Exhibit house,no,2026-11-08
Swag,T-shirts (300),2700,2580,2580,Print shop,no,2026-11-02
Hospitality,Booth coffee cart,1500,,,,,

Output (out/event-budget.md, from the full example):

**Into contingency.** Forecast $51,460 of $52,000 budget. Remaining $540 (-$2,060 after 5% contingency).

## Lines over budget
- Booth build and graphics (Booth): $1,450 over ($10,450 vs $9,000)

## Bills due within 7 days
- **OVERDUE 2d** 2026-11-02: Print shop, T-shirts (300), $2,580

## Unit costs (forecast)
- Per lead (180): $285.89

Claude then explains the overruns and suggests where to find the money. Try it with examples/event-budget.csv.

What it can access

• Reads and updates data/event-budget.csv.
• Writes out/event-budget.md and out/event-budget.json.
• Runs one script, scripts/budget.mjs (Node, no dependencies). No network.

Setup

None. Needs Node 18 or newer. Export your budget spreadsheet as CSV to get started.