FW: How to cancel imbalance amounts

[Mark Phillips]

Robert,

Gnucash uses double entry accounting. Every transaction has to be balanced
according to the accounting principle Assets = Liabilites + Owner's Equity.
Since you didn't balance the transaction, gnucash did it for you using the
account "imbalance".

Go to the accounts tab, find the account Imbalance and open it. Go through
each transaction and change the Imbalance account to a real balancing
account according to the accounting principle assets = liabilites + owners'
equity. Once done, the Imbalance account balance will be zero.

Mark

You didn't balance the transaction, so the system balanced it for you.
Go read the docs about "Double Entry Accounting".  You failed to
provide the balancing account, so gnucash chose one for you.



On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 5:39 PM, ryoung1 <ryoung1 at paradise.net.nz> wrote:

>
>
> Sir/Madam
>
>
>
> New to GNUCASH I have just completed data entry of assets, including a
> significant number of share investments. The resulting asset total is
> correct as confirmed by independent records. No liabilities have been
> entered at this stage. The GNU version involved is 2.4.7 (build 2/7/2011)
> working through MS Windows version 7 professional.
>
>
>
> Things should be simple enough, but I am left with a large 'imbalance
> amount'. Using hypothetical figures to demonstrate, I have total assets
> $20,000, imbalance amount $5,000 and a difference figure of $15,000.
> Reports
> are inconsistent in their portrayal of these values.
>
>
>
> 1)     In the Accounts report 'Equity' appears as $15,000, 'imbalance
> amount' as $0.00, and commoditiy 'grand total' as $20,000.
>
> 2)     In the Account Summary Sheet  'Equity' appears as $15,000, 'total
> assets' as $15,000 and 'imbalance' as $0,00.
>
> 3)     In the Balance Sheet report 'Total assets' appear as $16,000,
> 'equity' as $15,000, 'unrealised losses' $3,000, and 'total equity' as
> $12,000.
>
>
>
> In the 'opening balance' account there are quite a few entries where share
> accounts are correctly named but show no dollar amounts denoting value of
> investments in the credit column. Yet share names and dollar values seem to
> be correctly stated in the register of individual share accounts.
>
>
>
> I am very familiar with investment and general accounting procedures, but
> not with computer programming terms and concepts.
>
>
>
> Could you please explain procedure to normalise the reporting. GNUCASH help
> files note that imbalance amounts can be eliminated with the Actions/check
> and repair utility but that leads nowhere.
>
>
>
> I do hope that there is a simple answer to this. Your program is powerful
> but familiarisation is time-consuming and not for the faint-hearted.
>
>
>
> Please redirect this enquiry if it is not within your area of expertise.
>
>
>
> With thanks and regards
>
> Robert Young
>
> Email: ryoung1 at paradise.net.nz
>
>
>
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