Fiscal Dates

In some situations, a date field needs to be expressed in terms of an organization's fiscal year. Calendar years run from January 1st until December 31st, but an organization’s fiscal year might start in a different month. For example, a company’s fiscal year might run from June 1st through May 31st. In such cases, it’s appropriate to display some date values in a view using fiscal equivalents (Fiscal Year, Fiscal Quarter, and Fiscal Week Number) rather than their calendar equivalents.
To express date fields in fiscal terms, follow these steps:

1. Right-click the data source in the Data window to open the Date Properties dialog box.
   This change affects the fiscal year for all date dimensions in the data source.
   
2. Set the Fiscal year start field to the appropriate month.
   
3. Right-click the date dimension in the Data window and select Default Properties > Calendar Type > Fiscal Calendar. This option is only available on fields that are classified as date dimensions.
   

Whether a given level of a date dimension is affected by the use of the Fiscal Calendar depends on the specific case. Consult the following table:

Date Level	When Converted to Fiscal
Year	Reflects the fiscal year. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the year for the date June 1, 2004 would be shown as FY 2005.
Quarter	The Quarter reflects the fiscal quarter. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the quarter for the date June 1, 2004 would be Q1.
Month	No change in behavior. The calendar month is the same as the fiscal month.
Day	No change in behavior. The calendar day is the same as the fiscal day.
Hour	No change in behavior. The calendar hour is the same as the fiscal hour.
Minute	No change in behavior. The calendar minute is the same as the fiscal minute.
Second	No change in behavior. The calendar second is the same as the fiscal second.
Week Number	The Week Number reflects the fiscal week number. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the week number for the date April 1, 2004 would be 1.
Weekday	No change in behavior. The calendar weekday is the same as the fiscal weekday.
MM/YYYY	No change in behavior. This date format always displays calendar dates, even when a fiscal year has been assigned.
M/D/Y	This date format always displays Calendar dates, even when a fiscal year has been assigned.

The only date levels that explicitly indicate that the fiscal calendar is in use are the Year and Quarter level. Specifically, fiscal years and quarters are shown with the FY prefix. This is not true for fiscal quarters or week numbers, however, which are not shown with any special fiscal markings.
Fiscal year designations for any given date dimension are applied to all instances of the field in the Tableau workbook. Fiscal dates can only be applied to dimensions in a relational data source.
Fiscal year formatting is applied to all date formats that include a year, or a year and a quarter. In particular, if you apply a custom date format, and only use the “y” and “q” placeholders, then FY will be prepended to each year.

Date Truncations

When a date dimension is using a fiscal calendar, only the following date parts and truncations will reflect the fiscal calendar:

Date part or truncation	When using a fiscal calendar
Year date part	Reflects the fiscal year. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the year for the date June 1, 2004 would be shown as FY 2005.
Quarter date part	Reflects the fiscal quarter. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the quarter for the date June 1, 2004 would be Q1.
Week Number date part	Reflects the fiscal week number. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to April, the week number for the date April 1, 2004 would be 1.
Year date truncation	Truncates to the start of the fiscal year. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to May, the date June 1, 2004 would become May 1, 2004.
Quarter date truncation	Truncates to the start of the fiscal quarter. For example, if Fiscal year start is set to July, the date June 1, 2004 would become April 1, 2004.