Run a calculation

Open the house you want and select Run calculation, or select Run the calculation straight after adding a house or setting its custom splits to land here directly. The page is headed by the house’s own name, with Run a calculation underneath it so you always know which house you are on. It opens with the house rent, its participants and its cost lines already loaded. Every figure updates as you type, and nothing becomes a saved scenario until you choose Save scenario, so you can try numbers freely. The page does keep a private draft as you work, which is what lets you pick up where you left off.

If you left a calculation part-finished, a banner tells you it resumed from your last unsaved session. Choose Discard draft to start clean, and confirm when it asks.

If something is blocking the calculation

A red bar at the top names any cost centre that is switched on but still has no price, for example “2 cost centres are switched on but have no price: Electricity, Gas. Add a price or switch them off, then run again.” Each name is a link straight to that line on the cost-centre set’s page, so fixing it is one click away.

The bar only lists lines that would actually charge someone. A blank meal line with nobody’s meals ticked, or a blank consumables line nobody is signed up to, does not appear here and does not block anything - it only becomes a problem once a participant actually depends on it. If a price is cleared elsewhere while you have this page open, running the calculation can still show the same kind of message even when the bar did not name it when the page loaded.

Set the inputs

The Inputs panel at the top repeats the house’s Rent / FN and Bedrooms for participants so you can confirm you are on the right house. “/ FN” means per fortnight, everywhere on this page.

Two boxes are yours to change:

• Calc date decides which Centrelink rate version applies. The note under the box names the rates in use.
• Provider rent contribution / FN is what your organisation puts towards the house rent before the rest is shared out. Enter more than the house rent and the page warns you that participant rent will go negative.

Centrelink payment profiles underneath is read-only, one row per payment a participant receives. Change these on the house page. What they do is explained in Centrelink benchmarks.

Read the breakdown, column by column

Per-participant breakdown has one column per participant, with the same column at each end whatever the house.

• Line on the far left names the row. Rent comes first, then every cost line grouped under its category heading. Under each name is a small Subsidy % caption, which labels the row of entry boxes sitting in the participant columns.
• Then one column per participant, headed with their name (Alex, Priya, Sam). Each cell shows that participant’s dollars per fortnight for that line. Enter a percentage in the Subsidy % box to have your organisation cover that share instead. The dollars drop and a small “Subsidy $9.00” note appears underneath showing what you absorbed.
• Apply to all on the far right copies one participant’s percentage on that row across everyone else. It copies from the box you last typed in on that row, so you can work in any column. If you have not typed anything on the row this session it uses the first percentage already showing there. Emptying a box and then pressing Apply to all clears the whole row.

Reading down the rows: Rent / FN first, then the cost lines, each category closing with its own subtotal such as Food total / FN. Total / FN is what that participant is charged each fortnight, and Annualised is the same figure over a year.

Check against the caps

The last nine rows compare your figures with what Centrelink allows, in three blocks: rent, board, then the two combined. Each block shows the cap (for example Max Rental Contribution), the charge (Proposed Provider Rental Charge), and a Difference vs Proposed Charge row.

Green and negative means you are under the cap by that much, so $18.40 of headroom shows as -$18.40. Red and positive means the charge is over the cap by that amount. A charge landing exactly on the cap shows a green $0.00. Open Benchmarks to see how each cap was worked out, and Provider contribution for what your organisation carries.

Adjusting shared bill splits

Shared (90-day) bills, such as power, are not split on this page. Set or change them from the house’s own page, under Custom splits (shared bills) - select Edit custom splits to open the dedicated Custom splits page, make your change, and come back to rerun the calculation.

What you should see

Every participant column carries a dollar figure on every line, Rent / FN plus the category subtotals add up to Total / FN, and no difference row is red unless you meant it to be. Now give it a name in Scenario name and keep it: save a scenario.