Newbie Split Transaction Problem

[Fred Bone]

On 14 December 2014 at 17:39, Paul Warthe said:

> Hi guys,
> 
> I've attached 3 screen shots to help illustrate. Pretab.jpg shows the
> screen just before I hit tab on the medicare entry of $90. (I have already
> tried entering the federal tax amount of $180 in the deposit column but it
> was changed to a $490 entry in the Withdrawal column when I tabbed out of
> the cell.) The posttab.jpg shot shows the screen after I have entered tab
> twice. The medicare entry is changed to a $90 Withdrawal. The
> afterenter.jpg is what the entire entry looks like after entering all
> information and clicking on the Enter button. 

So you seem to have done this in this order:
1. Enter debit ("Deposit") of 670 in 1st split
  Gnucash will put balancing credit ("Withdrawal") 670 in 2nd split
2. Put "Federal Tax" in 2nd split and amend amount to 490 credit
  Gnucash creates 3rd split with balancing credit 180
3. Put "Medicare" in 3rd split and enter 90 in debit column without 
altering the credit.
 Gnucash puts the two values together giving net credit 90 and
creates 4th split with balancing credit 90

If you are dealing with the (perhaps most usual) case of a transaction 
with a single entry on one side and multiple on the other, I find it 
easiest to start with the single entry: in this case, I think, the credit 
one.