Reconciliation window: closing balance distorted and reconciliation date

[Jannick Asmus]

Hi Maf.,

On 02.05.2008 15:02, Maf. King wrote:
> On Friday 02 May 2008, Jannick Asmus wrote:
>> Maf,
>>
>> On 02.05.2008 13:41, Maf. King wrote:
>>
>>> I suggest that you will have to manually over-ride the ending balance
>>> when you start the reconcile, or adjust it using Reconcile-> Reconcile
>>> Information once you know what the discrepancy is.
>> This needs tedious calculations. I would like GC to do this job for me.
>>
> 
> Yes, I can see this manual method could lead to errors - although all you need 
> to do is substitute "balance_at_date" with "final_balance" in the reconcile 
> dialog - AFAIK, the ending balance is just grabbed from the register using 
> the reconcile date - you can just read the final future balance and insert 
> that - no calculation required!

This is a good idea: If the default balancing amount is the balance at 
date (which is available in GC), there is no manual entering needed any 
more - for everybody. I take this suggestion for the bug report I am 
going to file on this topic.

>>> There is a "bug" (deviation from user expectation) in how the reconcile
>>> dialog ending balance figure is auto-filled when you start the process.
>> I was wondering to file a bug at bugzilla. But first I wanted to hear
>> what others think about it. I think I should file shortly.
> 
> I don't think it is a bug, as such.  I think you are "bending" the reconcile 
> process to do something it isn't intended to do (more of this later).  It is 
> more like a RFE, IMHO.

Yes, indeed. :-)

>>> Does Umsatzsteuer work in the same way as UK VAT? 
> <SNIP>
>> That sounds quite similar to the German Umsatzsteuer system. 
> <SNIP>
>> I reconcile every account to avoid inconsistencies and apply proper
>> double accounting.
>>
> 
> This is what I mean about "bending" reconcilliation: (- and remember, IANAA!)
> 
> As I said in an earlier post, (as I understand it) -  to "reconcile" an 
> account is about checking that you and some other organisation agree about 
> the balance of an account at some point in time, not  to do with proper 
> double-entry accounting, or making txns "fixed" (although it does have that 
> side-effect with the warning dialog if you try to change a flagged txn)
> 
> 
> I see exactly what you are doing, and understand your reasoning, but if I may 
> make a suggestion -  don't reconcile your tax liability account every day (or 
> data-entry day/week/whatever) - do it only when the final total for the month 
> is known, then you should end up at 0.00 in the account - unless you have an 
> error!  

I understand your method. But it only works if there are balancing dates 
when their are no due-date-discrepancies as described in our discussion. 
But unfortunately there is no such date unless there was no invoice 
payment or a purchase in the previous month. But this happens seldom. ;) 
And should in the future - I hope for me. :-)

(I do this for my expenses claimed from my business, so I can see
> easily what is outstanding. ) 
> 
> Regards,
> Maf.

Viele Grüße
J.