How to share a budget vs actuals app with your team

Quick answer

To share a budget vs actuals report with your team, host it as a private app on Croft and give every budget owner one URL. Finance, department heads, and the leadership team see the same budget, actuals, and variance, with everyone signing in through company login. That is the path for a budget vs actuals app built with AI and for moving a budget spreadsheet to a private app for the team: a lasting private app, not a monthly emailed workbook, a dozen copies of the same sheet, or a public host.

Plenty of finance people and founders now build a budget vs actuals view in Claude, Cursor, or a rebuilt sheet: budget by month and cost centre, actuals from the ledger, variance in dollars and percent, and a short note on why a line is over. It often works well for the person who built it. The trouble starts when every department head needs to see their own numbers each month.

What usually happens:

You email the workbook or an HTML export after month end. Each manager gets a snapshot, replies with questions, and the comments live in ten inboxes.
You keep one master budget sheet. People overwrite formulas, add tabs, and nobody is sure which version matches the ledger.
You put the report on a public host. Salaries, supplier spend, and margins sit on the open web unless you build login yourself.
You walk through it on a call. A week later someone asks “why is marketing over?” and you rebuild the explanation from scratch.

So the report is useful. The team still does not have one live app with one shared set of numbers and explanations.

Other finance paths, if your starting point is different: host a financial model from Claude, turn a spreadsheet financial model into a private app, use Xero data in a private internal app, and share an expense tracker. This post is the budget vs actuals path.

For a report that goes to every budget owner each month, “share it” is not “any live URL.” It means:

A lasting URL finance and every department head can open in a browser
One set of numbers: the same budget, actuals, and variance for everyone
Team sign-in, so only your people see salaries, supplier spend, and margins
Variance notes saved in the app, so “why are we over?” is answered once, next to the line, not in email
Backups and a way to undo a bad budget edit or a wrong import
A path to keep improving it in chat (a reforecast column, a cost centre filter, a year-to-date view) without babysitting servers

Related reading when recoverability matters: App hosting with backups and versioning.

Emailed workbook vs public host vs shared sheet vs Croft

Need	Emailed workbook / export	Public AI-app host	Shared budget sheet	Croft
Every budget owner opens their own link	No	Yes	Yes, one big file	Yes
Same numbers for everyone	Snapshot per email	Extra setup	Until someone edits a formula	Yes, one app database
Private to your people	Inbox sprawl	You build login	Depends on sharing settings	Built in
Variance notes next to the line	Email replies	You build it	Cell comments	Yes, saved in the app
Pull actuals from your accounting system	Manual export	You wire it	Manual paste	Connectors, such as Xero
Keep iterating with AI chat	Limited	Varies	Limited	Yes
No devops required	N/A	Sometimes	N/A	Yes

Croft is the private place for vibe-coded and AI-artifact apps. It is not a public app host, and it is not “keep the spreadsheet forever and wrap it.” You bring the budget vs actuals report; Croft gives your team a shared app on a private server.

Steps: budget report to private team app

Start a free trial (a private server for your workspace).
Connect Claude or Cursor, or use Ask Croft in the browser if you prefer not to connect an assistant yet.
Hand the assistant the report: paste the artifact, share the budget sheet’s columns, or describe your cost centres, months, and how variance should be shown. Ask it to deploy the budget vs actuals report as an app on your croft (not to email a file or publish a public URL).
Load actuals the way that suits you: upload a monthly export, or use a connector such as Xero so the app can read ledger data. More on that path: Xero data in a private internal app.
Invite budget owners. They open a normal URL, sign in with company login, and add a note when their line is over or under.
Keep chatting to add a reforecast, a per-department view, or a flag for lines more than 10% off budget. Deploys and rollbacks stay on the server.

More on the product path: From artifact to app. Prefer Cursor for the next round of changes? See host a Cursor app. Starting points: templates.

You do not need to learn nginx, Docker, or “how to deploy.” The point of Croft is that the assistant can ship the app for you, whether you write code every day or never have.

FAQ

Host it as a private app on Croft, then invite finance and each budget owner. They get a normal link, the same numbers, and a place to explain variances. Details on artifacts to apps and connect Claude.

Can I just email the budget spreadsheet each month?

You can. Then every manager has a different snapshot, questions arrive by email, and next month starts the cycle again. That is fine for a one-off. It is not fine for a monthly report the whole leadership team relies on.

Can the app pull actuals from Xero?

Croft has a Xero connector, so a private app can read accounting data instead of you pasting exports. You can also start with a monthly upload and connect later. See use Xero data in a private internal app.

Why not keep using a shared budget sheet?

A sheet works until several people edit it at once, a formula breaks, and you cannot tell which tab is current. A private app keeps the budget, actuals, and notes in one database, shows each person a clear view, and keeps a history you can roll back.

Is this the same as putting the report on a public host?

Public hosts are strong for public products. Budget data is about as internal as it gets, so you usually want a private server and team sign-in by default, not a public URL you lock down after the fact. See also Where to host a vibe-coded app so it stays private.

Can developers use the same path?

Yes. Developers use Croft when they want a quick private tool for the team without setting up a full hosting platform; see Croft for developers.

How much does Croft cost?

Solo from $24/month on annual billing, Team $99/month on annual. 7-day free trial, no card to start. See pricing.

Start free trial → · Artifacts to apps → · Connect Xero →

Quick answer

The report works for you. Sharing it is broken.

What sharing budget vs actuals should mean