What's Cooking in Business Central: Sneak Peek into New Financial Reporting Enhancements (part 1)
Financial reporting enhancements announced for the Business Central 2025 release: an internal description field for report definitions, editable introductory and closing paragraphs, and a negative amount format option (parentheses). All three are demoed in a 5-minute part 1 video.
- Introduction to 2025 financial reporting enhancements
- Internal description field for report authors
- Introductory and closing paragraphs feature
- Negative amount formatting for accountants
- Export and formatting options summary
Overview
This short “What’s Cooking” video from January 2025 previews three financial reporting changes coming in the 2025 release. The presenter demos each one on a balance sheet report.
Report authors get an internal description field that is separate from the regular description column, which shows as a heading. Users can add text above and below a report through a new menu action, and that text appears in PDF and Excel exports. A negative amount format option shows negative numbers in parentheses instead of with minus signs. The presenter says more features will come in another video.
Key points
- The internal description field is announced for report authors to describe what a financial report is for. It is set via Definitions > Edit report definition.
- Keep internal notes out of the regular description column. That column appears as a heading in the report, so use the internal description instead.
- The Edit introductory and closing paragraphs action adds text above and below a report. The text shows when you export to PDF or Excel.
- The demo uses the introductory and closing text to mark a report as a preliminary version and to note that it was checked by an internal auditor.
- The negative amount format option lets you show negative numbers in parentheses instead of minus signs.
- The negative amount format can be chosen in Options when viewing the report on screen, and in the request page options when exporting to PDF.
- All three features are announced for the 2025 release, and the presenter says further enhancements will be covered in another video or at the Business Central launch event.
Features
Every feature below: announced, demoed.
| Feature | At | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Internal description field | 0:07 | “if you work with financial reporting in business Central we have a few things coming up in the 2025 release” (0:07) |
| Edit introductory and closing paragraphs | 1:08 | “if you work with financial reporting in business Central we have a few things coming up in the 2025 release” (0:07) |
| Negative amount format option | 2:33 | “if you work with financial reporting in business Central we have a few things coming up in the 2025 release” (0:07) |
AL objects mentioned
As heard in the captions. A name that matches one object page by exact type and name links to it; the others stay as named.
- other “balance sheet” at 0:47
Quotes
- 0:07 “if you work with financial reporting in business Central we have a few things coming up in the 2025 release”
- 0:27 “this allows you as a report author to describe what this report is for as an internal description”
- 1:28 “edit introductory and closing paragraphs this allows you to put some text”
- 3:28 “a new a new part of this menu is called negative amount format I can choose parenthesis instead”
- 4:26 “we have a lot more here so you’ll have to wait for another video to see that maybe in what’s cooking”
Disclaimers in the video
- 0:07 coming-later: we have a few things coming up in the 2025 release