Where do I place incoming money that's not Income?

Leo Breebaart leo at lspace.org
Sat Nov 18 12:31:06 EST 2006


I have a small newbie 'policy' question on where to place certain
information in my GnuCash account structure.

A while back my mobile phone was stolen while I was on holiday.
Eventually, the travel insurance company paid up, and deposited
money in my bank account.

My question: what account do I put on the *other* side of the
ledger? My first thought was to simply record it as a 'rebate'
entry on Expenses:InsurancesPremiums:Travel, but that obfuscates
the primary purpose for the parent account. I want to track how
much I spend on insurance premiums per year, and the rebate money
should not be part of that equation.

Or I put in "Income:Misc", but that feels so odd, because it's
not really 'income', now is it?

A third possibility is to place it as a rebate in
Expenses:Tech:Hardware instead, which is where the cost for the
replacement phone was put. I think I like this option the best,
because there the rebate does contribute correctly to the
subtotals in the branch. I did *not* spend X+X on two phones that
year, I spent X+(X-R), with R being the money from the insurance.

Or, quite possibly, I am over-thinking this mightily, and I
should get a life instead of wondering about the optimal
administration of a couple dozen EUR... :-)

Still, any "this is how *I* would do it" feedback will be more
than welcome.

-- 
Leo Breebaart  <leo at lspace.org>



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