accounts payable

Jean-David Beyer jdbeyer at exit109.com
Thu Jul 24 11:42:19 CDT 2003


Jon Lapham wrote:
 > Jean-David Beyer wrote:
 >
 >> Jon Lapham wrote (in part):
 >>> Using the integrated A/P system in GnuCash:
 >>>
 >>> Firstly, the system is quite nice, but let me bounce some
 >>> ideas/questions off everyone to make sure I'm fully
 >>> understanding.
 >>>
 >>> What is the recommended way to bill something from which there is
 >>> no obvious job and/or chargeback project?  For example, the
 >>> purchasing of paper products for the office.  You could create a
 >>> Job, maybe called "Office Supplies", or simply leave the Job
 >>> empty?  The "chargeback" would go to the company itself, I guess?
 >>>
 >>>
 >> I would suppose that billing some entity requires such an entity.
 >> These things you mention have no such entity.
 >>
 >> You would need an account, such as "overhead" or "general and
 >> administrative," to which you "bill" these items.
 >>
 >
 > There is a place in the bill where you specify what expense account
 > to balance the transaction.  Is that what you mean?

I believe so. If I billed 1/100 the price of a box of paperclips or 1/2
a Pink Pearl erasor to an actual customer, they would think I was 
running some fly-by-night fleabag operation. Better to charge the 
customer x% on an overhead line and y% on a G&A line and be done with 
it. (The comptroller of a company I used to work for called the G&A 
line: Get 'Em Again.)
 >
 > If so, the specification of the expense account (which works with
 > accounts) is different from setting the job and chargeback (which
 > works with Customers).
 >
 > Uh, I think.  :)
 >
Yes, but you could say you have 10 customers and each accounts for 10% 
of your billing. In that case you could charge them 10% of your overhead 
and G&A amounts, probably legitimately. We did that when I worked on 
government contracts decades ago. IIRC, we billed them 95% on top of 
directly chargeable expenses for overhead and 23% for G&A. The Navy 
auditors accepted that. Others I worked for charged as much as 150% for 
overhead.

-- 
   .~.  Jean-David Beyer           Registered Linux User 85642.
   /V\                             Registered Machine    73926.
  /( )\ Shrewsbury, New Jersey     http://counter.li.org
  ^^-^^ 10:35am up 2 days, 15:30, 2 users, load average: 2.07, 2.14, 2.11



More information about the gnucash-user mailing list