Split Confusion

[Robert Heller]

At Sun, 13 Dec 2009 15:58:30 -0600 "Leak, Thomas B" <Thomas.B.Leak at snapon.com> wrote:

> 
> Hi.  I am new to GnuCash and need a little newbie help.  I want to
> enter a transaction from Target for $140.  $40 of the transaction is
> Expenses:Clothing and the rest is Expenses:Groceries.  In other apps,
> you would enter the entire amount and then hit a split button that
> would allow you to allocate the expense into the correct categories
> insuring that the splits add up to the grand total.  The grand total
> would just come out of the checking account balance.  How can I do this
> in GnuCash?
>  
> It looks like it wants me to enter a deposit and withdrawal.  Sorry,
> I am confused.

The way I do it is to initially enter it as if it was just to one
expense account, then click the split button.  This will should the full
ammount being deducted from one account (I'm guessing your credit card
(if you paid with your card, your checking account (if you paid by check
or check (debit) card, or cash if you paid in cash).  Leave this line
alone.  Change the amount on the Expense:whatever line to what it should
be and push the up or down arrow keys.  GnuCash will now open a new line
with the remaining amount.  Select the proper account (the other expense
account).

The 'deposit' and 'withdrawal' is slightly confusing, but what is going
on is standard double entry bookkeeping.  GnuCash does NOT have
'categories', what it has are accounts.  ALL money does is move from
account to account -- it neither 'appears' nor 'disapears' -- double
entry bookkeeping is like the law of conservation of mass and energy in
physics.  You have three accounts involved in your transaction: one of
the accounts I'm guessing is a bank account (eg checking account with a
debit card associated with it, at least this is how *I* buy stuff at
Target).  Bank accounts have deposits and withdrawals, so the two
columns (think of them as the in and out columns) are labeled
"deposits" and "withdrawals". Other types of accounts might have
different labels, but in all cases one column is money coming in and
the other is money going out: when you spend money on expenses, your
checking account balance gets smaller and you expense balance gets
larger: money moves from one account to another. In this case, you have
a $140 *withdrawal* from the checking account (outbound money), so one
line of the split will have the checking account selected in the
'account' column and $140.00 in the withdrawal column.  Then it will
have two more lines, one with "Expenses:Clothing" selected in the
account column and $40.00 in the 'deposit' column (this transfers $40
from your checking account to your "Expenses:Clothing" account) and the
third line has "Expenses:Groceries" in the account column and $100.00
in the 'deposit' column (this transfers $100 from your checking account
to your "Expenses:Groceries" account).  Since 40+100 (deposit) = 140
(withdrawal), the 'split' balances.  Click the + button and you are
done.

(Something different happens when you deposit your paycheck: money comes
out of your Income:Job and goes into your Checking account.  Actually,
if you wanted to be anal, money comes out of your Income:Job, and some
goes to Taxes:Withholding:US, some to Taxes:Withholding:MyState, some to
Investment:Retirement, some to Insurance:Health, and whatever is left
goes to your Checking Account.)

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-- 
Robert Heller             -- 978-544-6933
Deepwoods Software        -- Download the Model Railroad System
http://www.deepsoft.com/  -- Binaries for Linux and MS-Windows
heller at deepsoft.com       -- http://www.deepsoft.com/ModelRailroadSystem/