Confused about interaction between A/R and Income with Reports

[Maf. King]

On Saturday 16 January 2010 04:22:38 Roland Roberts wrote:
> I'm trying to prepare an income/expense reports and find that my A/P and
> A/R show up in the Income and Expense accounts.  On the one hand, this
> makes sense.  On the other hand, it's not what I want as it shows income
> that has not actually been received as if it had.
>
> And yes, I've selected the default set of accounts so that Assets,
> Equity, and Liabilities are not selected.
>
> This is with GnuCash 2.2.9.
>
> Is there any way to get a report that shows only actual income and
> expense, not unrealized income and expense?
>
> roland

Hi Roland.

IMHO A/R is treated as "real income" for tax calculations etc.

But, since that isn't the question you asked, some things I can think of to 
suggest are (anywhere I say A/R, can apply to A/P too): 

1. is the A/R account selected in the report options - have you gone through 
the accounts tree and checked that it is actually under assets?, and not 
selected as a leaf, even if the parent tree is not selected?

2. If you are seeing transfers to A/R from income accounts, then that is 
probably to be expected.  You could try filtering to exclude the A/R account, 
but I'm fairly sure that won't work, as it will probably nobble some 
transaction you do want to retain!

3. Just subtract the ending balance of A/R off the Income Total.  Yes, it is a 
manual step, and thus a pain, but about the only practical help I can think 
of.

HTH,
Maf.