Instrumentl Spenddown provides a single, up-to-date view of how grant funds are being spent. Through a secure, one-way sync with your accounting system, it automates Budget vs. Actuals (BvA) tracking so you can clearly see what's been spent, what remains committed, and what is still available — without manual exports or repeated data pulls from Finance.

This shared visibility makes it easier for Grants, Finance, and Program teams to stay aligned on restricted funding throughout the post-award process.

Instrumentl Spenddown brings your approved budget, actual expenses, and planned costs into a single shared system, so everyone can see the full financial picture in real time.
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With Spenddown, you can:

By centralizing your grant budget and expense data in one place, Spenddown makes it easier to generate accurate reports and answer key questions like, "How much do we have left to spend?"

Spenddown connects three core components to give you a complete Budget vs. Actuals view.

Upload your approved award budget (PDF or spreadsheet), and Instrumentl will parse it into structured categories.

This becomes your working budget inside Instrumentl — organized, editable, and ready to sync.

Instrumentl Spenddown connects to:

The integration uses a secure, one-way sync. Instrumentl pulls expense data from your accounting system but never writes data back, so Finance remains in full control of the general ledger.

During setup, you'll map your accounting categories to your Instrumentl grant budget categories. After that, expenses sync automatically.

You can also import expenses via a spreadsheet if you don't use any of the three accounting platforms Instrumentl integrates with. Learn how by reading this guide.

You can log expected or committed costs that have not yet appeared in your accounting system. This allows your team to see:

Together, these components give you an accurate view of your grant budget at any point in time, not just a snapshot once the books are closed.

Manually add an expense, and then select 'Planned' under "Expense Status". Alternatively, open the Category Actions menu and select + Planned expense.

Apart from the three components of Instrumentl Spenddown described above, there are several other manual capabilities for building and adjusting your budget and expenses: Expense categories, manually adding expenses, expense actions, tracking

Expense categories let you organize your grant budget into funder-approved spending areas and track actuals against each one. Your categories are created automatically when Instrumentl parses your uploaded budget — but you can also create, edit, or delete them at any time.

Under Budget & Expenses, select + Add Expense Category.

A panel will open from the right-hand side. Enter the category's name (required), description, and the budgeted amount (both optional), and then click Save.

To rename a category or update its Description or Amount Budgeted, select Edit from the Category Actions menu (three-dot button on the far right of the category row).

To remove a category, select Delete from the Category Actions menu.

You can nest expense (sub)categories under a parent expense category to reflect your award's budget structure. "Subcategories" appear indented beneath their parent in the Budget & Expenses section, with totals rolling up to the parent row.

Add a subcategory directly from a parent category's Category Actions menu by selecting + Category.

An Expense Category panel will slide in from the right. At the bottom, you'll see the "Parent Expense Category".

Synced expenses arrive automatically from your accounting system, but you can also add expenses manually — for example, to log costs that haven't yet been recorded in your books, or to track committed spend in advance (see Planned Expenses above).

You can manually add an individual expense in two ways:

A) Open the Category Actions menu and select + Expense to add an expense directly to that category.

B) Open the + Add Expenses dropdown menu at the top of the Budget & Expenses section and select + Add an expense. In the next step, you'll choose the expense category.

A New Expense panel will slide in from the right. Enter the Transaction Date, Amount, and Category (all required). You may also add a Description, Notes, and Transaction ID. Click Save when finished.

Your new expense will appear in the designated category, ordered chronologically by Transaction Date.

To manage existing expenses, first expand the relevant expense category by clicking the dropdown arrow 🔽.

Next, open the Expense Actions menu (three-dot button on the far right) for the expense you wish to modify.

Select Edit from the Expense Actions menu to open the Edit Expense panel.

Move an expense to a different expense category from the Edit Expense panel under 'Category'. Open the dropdown menu and scroll/search for the category you wish to reassign this expense to.

When you're finished making changes, select Save (or Cancel to undo edits).

To remove an expense from an award, select Delete from the Expense Actions menu.

Alternatively, select Delete Expense from within the Edit Expense panel.

If you want to keep an expense visible in your budget without counting it toward your spenddown totals — for example, a transaction that synced from your books but doesn't apply to this grant's reportable spend — select Ignore from the Expense Actions menu.

When an expense is ignored:

To revert an ignored expense back to its original state, select Unignore from the Expense Actions menu. The expense amount will once again be factored into all financial metrics.

Instrumentl gives you multiple lenses for monitoring grant spend — from the high-level award overview down to individual expense categories and exportable reports.

Within an awarded grant's Financials tab, the Overview section shows the amount awarded, amount spent, and amount remaining — along with a visual indicator of your spending pace relative to where you are in the grant period (On Track or Off Track).
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Scroll down further in the 'Financials' tab to view a breakdown of your award spend by expense category. Each category has its own graph showing the $ and % spent, as well as the remaining allocated amount.

There are two types of reports for Spenddown data: the Budget vs Actuals report and the Financials report.

If you're just getting started, follow this recommended order:

If you have any questions about Spenddown or need help with setup, we're here for you. Message our friendly Support team when logged into your account, or email us at hello@instrumentl.com.