Bump: setting the accounting period

[John Ralls]

On Mar 18, 2011, at 4:16 AM, Elizabeth Dodd wrote:

> On Fri, 18 Mar 2011 21:59:44 +1100
> Karl Auer <kauer at biplane.com.au> wrote:
> 
>> On Fri, 2011-03-18 at 11:03 +0100, Geert Janssens wrote:
>>>> This is probably an embarrassingly simple question but - how do I
>>>> set up for an accounting year that runs from 1 July through 30
>>>> June?
>>>> 
>>>> The options available in Edit->Preferences are:
>>>> 
>>>>   today
>>>>   start of this month
>>>>   start of previous month
>>>>   start of this quarter
>>>>   start of previous quarter
>>>>   start of this year
>>>>   start of previous year
>>>>   absolute
>> 
>> The more I look at these, the less I understand them. How can the
>> start of the accounting period be "today"? What does that mean? Is it
>> converted to a date for internal use? If so, does it change every day,
>> or does it stay the same, once set? What are the start and end dates
>> actually used for?
>> 
>> Accounting in Australia very commonly runs from 1 July through 30
>> June. It seems to me that to support that, GnuCash would have to add
>> a field to this dialogue "Year starts on", with a  default of "1
>> January", and permitting values such as "1 January" "start January",
>> "end January". This additional field would then permute the meaning
>> of "this year", "last year" etc.
>> 
>> I'd like to discuss this before I post it as an idea. How do other
>> Australian users handle this?
>> 
>> Regards, K.
>> 
> 
> all I can answer is that I have got absolute start and finish dates set
> currently 01/07/10 and 30/06/11
> relative start dates would mean I wouldn't have to change them later

I had a look at the developer documentation, and I think that the setting is supposed to indicate the current accounting period. Reports offer the option of selecting the "current accounting period" and the "previous accounting period". The various intervals are available for users who close their books more often than annually.

So leave the accounting year preference set for the current fiscal year, and update it after you close your books each year. Use the "previous accounting period" options on reports when you want to look at data for that period; you'll have to use specific dates on those options for earlier periods. This holds regardless of whether you keep all of your data in one file or if, like Karl, you start a new file every year.

I certainly agree that the setting could be done better. How about:
<Close Books> Annually, Quarterly, Monthly, Weekly, Irregular
<Period Starts> Either an arbitrary date or day of the week for the first period of the year; defaults to 1 January.
<Period Ends> Only valid for an irregular accounting period, an arbitrary date; defaults to 31 December. Otherwise the period ends the day before the next period begins.

Irregular accounting periods (the US's IRS calls them "short years") happen when one starts up or winds down an entity on a date after the beginning of the regular accounting period. For example, starting a business on 15 February which will use the calendar year for its fiscal year.

Regards,
John Ralls