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Official Website

of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

    The .gov means its official.

    Local, state, and federal government websites often end in .gov. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania government websites and email systems use "pennsylvania.gov" or "pa.gov" at the end of the address. Before sharing sensitive or personal information, make sure you're on an official state website. 

    All school districts, intermediate units, career and technology centers and charter schools must use the Consolidated Financial Reporting System (CFRS) as the "uniform form" required to be used to submit the General Fund Budget to the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE). Software for prior years is available on our FTP site.

    The Downloads section below contains links to instruction manuals and the Manual of Accounting.

    Budget Adoption Deadlines

    Preliminary Budget/Resolution Not to Exceed Index (school district only)

    The timeline related to these events can be found on the Property Tax Relief page.

    Final Budget (school districts, career and technology centers, charter schools)

    The deadline for school districts, career and technology centers and charter schools to adopt the Final General Fund Budget is June 30. The deadline for submission to PDE is no later than 15 days after final adoption.  

    The deadline for intermediate units to adopt the Final General Fund Budget is May 1. The submission deadline is also May 1.

    The General Fund Budget submission within CFRS is subject to the provisions of the Section 2552.1 of the School Code.

    Instructions

    The following links contain instruction manuals and other resources. 

    GFB User Manual (PDF)
    General instructions for all users

    Revenue function import list (PDF)

    Expenditure function-object import list​ (PDF)

    Chart of Accounts 
    Link to Office of Comptroller Operations website containing the Manual of Accounting, which includes the Chart of Accounts (chapter 20).

    Other Important Information

    The following files contain excerpts from the Pennsylvania Public School Code pertaining to the required use of the General Fund Budget, limitations on certain fund balances, and school districts located in multiple counties.

    24 PS 6-687(a)
    School code text referencing the annual budget,   including required public inspection certification.

    Fund Balance Limitations
    Information related to limits pursuant to 24 PS 6-688, enacted by Act 48 of 2003, pertaining to school district limitations on ending unreserved undesignated fund balance (now unassigned) when raising real estate taxes (this pertains to final budget only).

    Note: See Accounting Bulletin 2010-1 for information about new terminology for fund balance categories.

    24 PS 6-672.1
    School code section related to school districts lying in more than one county or in more than one municipality.

    For questions, please contact ra-GFB@pa.gov.