Registry Entry math error

[Mike or Penny Novack]

Just a suggestion (for this and all like "math error" complaints)

It would possibly be of some help if along with describing your problem 
you tell us either:

1) I used to keep books the old fashioned way and so have some 
experience finding errors.
2) This (gnucash) is my first experience with double entry bookkeeping.
3) I've used other bookkeeping software but am new to gnucash.
4) I am experienced with gnucash

It's just that knowing which can save time deciding WHAT SORT of error 
to look for first.

While "autoposting" software like gnucash eliminates the most common 
source of bookkeeping errors (those from the "posting" process) it 
cannot eliminate the sort of errors caused by entering wrong numbers or 
right numbers but in wrong account.

Every time I prepare the quarterly reports and reconcile against the 
bank statements (old fashioned sense of "reconcile") I often discover an 
error or two to clean up. Rare that there is none. And I am pretty 
experienced, both with gnucash, other accounting software, and of course 
the old fashioned way (since computerized accounting didn't exist when I 
first learned bookkeeping). It is always an error that I made, never one 
in the computer program doing arithmetic. There are "tricks" and "rules 
of thumb" any experienced bookkeeper knows to relate the amount of the 
discrepancy to what might be the cause**.

Michael D Novack

** Though annoyingly, because forced to use "whole dollar reporting" 
while filling out the 990-EZ, I recently sent an hour or two tracking 
down a $24 discrepancy (the actual item missed was $25).