where can I find info on setting up credit card accounts

[Derek Atkins]

Hi,

Quoting Tim M <southern.tim at gmail.com>:

> Hi, I have been using GnuCash for about two years. I don't understand the
> first thing about accounting. I have researched the subject of credit card
> and GnuCash but that gets me more confused. I want to download my ccard
> statement and show those expenses in my checking account, but when importing
> the qif file it asks for the account name. The default is the month/day/year
> plus the last digits of the card. That confuses me. Should I just accept the
> default account name . . . and it seems I have done it only to not be able
> to find it later. The only way I can figure out how to do it is to use
> Quicken to import my statement and accept each item and then export the qif
> file to gnucash. It works but sort of defeats the purpose of using GnuCash.
> Can someone lead me to a site that might explain accounting in terms a
> carpenter can understand?
> Tim

Is this a TRUE credit card?  If so then you should create a Liability
account for the card.  The transactions will NOT appear in your
checking account because they are not checking txns, but CC txns.
Then your monthly CC Payment (Assets:Checking -> Liabilities:Credit Card)
pays off your monthly balance.  In this case when you import your CC
txns you should map it to your CC Liability Account.

If this is a DEBIT card (or a Cheque Card) then you can just map
it all to your checking account.

You should read the GnuCash Tutorial and Concepts Guide chapter
on CC Accounts.

> Please remember to CC this list on all your replies.
> You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.

-derek

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available