undo close books?

Geoff Jankowski geoff.jankowski at me.com
Fri Oct 4 02:56:16 EDT 2013


William

I confess I take a different view.  On my VT accounts package I lock each year.  If I try to enter something in a prior year I get a message and if I really want to make the change I can but it serves as a good reminder not to mess with prior year accounts.  I do not see this as an accountant demand but a user discipline aid for those of us that run our own business and accounts.  We are so busy trying to make money that we do not have time to be accounting principles experts as well.

While paper copies are used at the moment, I see the uk moving quickly to an online submission system and it will be necessary to be able to refer back to prior electronic accounts (previous 7 years) that are accurate against the submitted accounts.  It is not an issue at the moment but I do not think it would be a bad idea to provide a locking option longer term in the software.




Geoff

Geoff Jankowski
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> On 4 Oct 2013, at 06:52, whwtan <whwtan at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi Geoff,
> 
> Actually this applies for any accounting software so I find it really...silly how accountants want to "lock" binary digits on the computer. Locking for the year end in other accounting software only makes it more troublesome to make changes and does not prevent anyone from simply "redoing" the year itself.
> Like David stated, and I completely agree, from the developers' point of view. It is deceivingly misleading.
> 
> Couldn't you print out the year end as a physical copy, get an auditor to stamp and date it when it is done?
> This is how I would do it. Anything you leave on a computer as data, you can make changes and nobody would be wiser.
> 
> William
> 
>> On 4/10/2013 1:33 PM, David wrote:
>> There is no such locking mechanism. That's part of the GnuCash ethos. The developers have stated many times over the years that any such locking mechanism in the electronic realm is optimistic at best and deceivingly misleading at worst.
>> 
>> If you are legally required to demonstrate some sort of locked file, your best bet with GnuCash is probably burning CDs--but keep in mind that they can be compromised as well.
>> 
>> David
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> _____________________________________________
>> From: Geoff Jankowski <geoff.jankowski at me.com>
>> Sent: Thu Oct 03 21:58:55 PDT 2013
>> To: "gnucash-user at gnucash.org" <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
>> Subject: Re: undo close books?
>> 
>> 
>> In the UK (and I assume the US) it is standard practice to close off the books at the year end and transfer the balances. Indeed my accountant also makes me lock the accounts so that I cannot change them once this is done.
>> 
>> The reason is that once the accounts have been submitted to the Authorities they must not be changed and it is really easy to accidentally add an entry that predates the year end cut off which then imbalances the prior year end. Locating these accidental changes can be a nightmare at the following year end which has to start from the same balances agreed with the accountant for the prior year.
>> 
>> I have yet to find a year end locking function on gnu cash but I am still learning it as I transfer my accounts to it. If someone knows where it is, it would save me time trying to find it!
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Geoff
>> 
>> Geoff Jankowski
>> +44 77 70 58 48 38
>> +44 20 71 00 10 92
>> +33 5 46 97 13 89
>> Sent from my iPad
> 



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