Pls help model this situation

[James Kerr]

On Tuesday 20 July 2010 jhw wrote:

> Hi Guys, please can you help me with this.  Normal set of domestic
> accounts but my stepdaughter's father pays child support +
> expenses for her horse. When I get a cheque from him it's easy
> enough - I transact Income:Other to Assets:Checking.  But say I
> pay $100 for horse shoes: I want to keep track of the fact he owes
> me the money but can't figure out how to do it.  I tried an
> Accounts/Receivable type of account but this still expects a
> balancing transaction: what's the other account? Is it just
> Imbalance?
> 
> I have tried Income:other:owing and Income:other:paid with a -ve
> amount in the former and a +ve in the latter but gnucash sums the
> absolute values here which seems odd.   When I have a -ve expense
> (such as -$20 in expenses:clothing for a refund), the signs are
> respected when the expenses are totalled, as I would expect.
> 
> Tearing my hair out a bit, and don't want to supplement my .gnucash
> with some post-it notes, so any advice or suggestion would be very
> welcome. Thanks in advance...

When you pay the bill:

Debit (increase) Receivable from "Stepfather"
Credit (decrease) Bank (or Cheque Account)

When he pays you:

Debit (increase) Bank
Credit (decrease) Receivable

Jim