Transfer of money from different gnu cash files

Lukas Haase lukashaase at gmx.at
Mon Jan 7 22:33:18 EST 2013


On 1/6/2013 11:09 PM, GCMAB wrote:
> Is there a particular reason why you want to have two separate files?

Yes. All my old stuff is based on EUR.
All my new stuff is based on $.

Of course I can use currency conversion and I already did this is my old
file. However, this was always more a pain.

I started a new "life" where I have new incomings, new expenses(!), new
currency so I wanted to start from a clean file.

> I also have assets, income and expenses in more than one country but use a
> single set of accounts because like you there is not a distinct separation
> and there are times when I need to span both countries.

Yes, but maybe only 3% of the transactions span both files.
The rest is only either in the US or the EU file.

> It does mean that I have to have pairs of accounts for some things, one in
> each currency but with two separate files you would have this anyway. Where
> a transaction is in more than one currency such as a US purchase on a
> European credit card GnuCash automatically prompts for an exchange
> rate/amount making it easy to manage.

As I said, this adds much complexity and above all, I have completely
different expenses now.

Even if, my old ones are in EUR. Should I just change it to $?

Technically, much would be possible but it adds so much complexity and
and I do regard my approach as more clean.

But in fact, I have the same issue with my wife: I have my personal file
(and want to keep it personal) but many things are shared. Fortunately
so far, she does not use GNU cash, so I just take over everything. But I
would really like her to have her own gnu cash file and we transfer the
money (when she buys shared stuff or when I do).

> I've chosen to duplicate at a high level which in your case would mean
> "Expenses - US" and "Expenses - European" each with the appropriate group of
> sub-accounts.

Hmm, yes you're right, this would solve my issues above. But now I
already started with my system and had it for one year. Merging the two
files will be much work I think.

So would you also have then "Equity EU", "Equity US", "Assets EU",
"Assets US", "Income EU", "Income US"?

For the case, I still stick with my two files: What is the best approach
for the transfer accounts? Again, is "Equity" for the Transfer-In and
"Expenses" for the Transfer-Out the right approach?

Thanks,
Luke







More information about the gnucash-user mailing list