Managing U.S. Flexible Spending Accounts

[Fred Frigerio]

I would probably have an Asset:FSA only. Then divert money into it from
either a Paycheck Split or from a different Asset account (Money Market,
Checking, etc) as you make deposits into it. The only use a regular person
would have for the Equity account would be when closing the year to 'move'
the difference between Income and Liabilities accounts to zero them out.

Fred Frigerio



On Mon, Jan 4, 2010 at 2:51 PM, Thomas Scofield <scofield at calvin.edu> wrote:

>
> I am a new user of GnuCash, and someone who has not had an accounting
> course of any kind.  (On the other hand, I am a mathematician, and the
> basics of double-entry accounting seem fairly intuitive if I can ever get
> the principle behind the labels "credit" and "debit".)  I have searched the
> archives for advice about setting up flexible spending accounts, and have
> only come across the post by John R. Carter on Jan. 5, 2009.  It is with
> that post in mind I am posing my question.
>
> I have created accounts
>  Liabilities:FSA
>  Equity:FSA
> after which I entered a transaction in Liabilities:FSA placing my year's
> allotment in the "Increase" column.  (The transfer account is Equity:FSA,
> where now the same amount appears in the "Decrease" column.)
>
> I am now at the point of entering a paycheck.  I placed the full amount in
> the "Income" column of a an "Income:Salary" transaction, and split the
> transfer account.  It is split many ways, as I am sending some to several
> different bank accounts, some to a "Expenses:social security" account, some
> to "Expenses:medicare", etc.  One of the accounts in the transfer split is
> "Expenses:FLEX".  Now, if I follow the advice of Mr. Carter, an entry in
> "Expenses:FLEX" would have its "double" appear in "Equity:FSA", decreasing
> the amount there from the initial FLEX allotment.  That makes sense to me,
> but it also makes sense that I should have it mirror what came out of my
> paycheck, and you (of course) cannot do both.  Any suggestions as to a
> sensible approach?
>
> Thomas L. Scofield
> --------------------------------------------------------
> Associate Professor
> Department of Mathematics and Statistics
> Calvin College
> --------------------------------------------------------
>
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