A reservation is not money

When LEAT holds budget for your request, nothing has been paid, promised
to anybody, or moved. This page explains the stages, because they get
confused and the confusion is expensive.

The five stages, and what each one means

• Available. Nothing has claimed it. This is what you can still spend.
• Reserved. Your request is holding it. Nobody else can spend it, and nobody has been promised anything.
• Committed. A purchase order, contract or subaward now stands behind it. Somebody outside LEAT has been promised something.
• Obligated. An invoice or a payroll charge has been recognised. LEAT owes the money.
• Actual. It has been posted to the books.

Why they are never added together

Because the same money passes through all five.

A report that added your reservation to the commitment it became and the
invoice that followed would count one cost three times. Every screen in
LEAT keeps them apart for that reason, and a report that shows one number
called "spent" is a report you should ask about.

Money moves between stages, it is never subtracted twice

When your reservation becomes a commitment, the line's available balance
does not change. The amount moved from one column to another. If it did
change, the budget would be wrong by the amount that is working properly.

Reservations can lapse

A hold has an expiry where the deployment sets one. When it lapses, the
money goes back to the line and your request has to hold it again.

What you cannot do

You cannot release a reservation that has become a commitment. The money
is behind a purchase order somebody is relying on, and freeing it would
let the next request spend it. Cancel the commitment first.