gnucash 2.6.3

[Michael Hendry]

On 4 Jun 2014, at 18:03, callis at buckinghamtutors.co.uk wrote:

> Could someone please help? I am a new gnucash user, and have set up a set of accounts, including Opening Balances. However, in the Account names listing there is an item which I have been unable to discover in any of the help pages. It is "Imbalance GBP" and appears to consist of all the Opening Balances. Why? What use is it? Can I get rid of it? (I have tried to delete it and all my opening balances disappeared.) The journal pages of the items in which I have set an Opening Balance have the amount listed twice - as a Debit and then once as a Credit marked "Imbalance GBP". It is then shown as the correct balance. Why?

You need a double-entry for Opening Balances as well as for anything else - if you don’t specify a source for the Opening Balance, you’ve created an unbalanced transaction, and GC deals with this illegal situation by creating a dummy transaction involving the “Imbalance GBP” account.

The usual way is to derive all the Opening Balances from Equity:Opening Balance.

Michael

> 
> I have kept the paper type of books for many years, and for the last 7 or so have been using Quickbooks, but now need to change to another accounting package. Nothing I have done in the past gives me any insight into what to do about this problem. 
> 
> HELP  please!!
> 
> Sincerely,
> N. J .Callis (Mrs.)
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