Simple beginner help

[Sean Clarke]

Hi Mark,

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

I don't really *need* to know how much I spend on milk in each store,
although I would like to know how much I spend on milk (in a given period).

For now lets assume I am not going to worry about going so granular.

More important is my reason for switching to GnuCash....   I've been using
a web based accounting tool called Wave (http://www.waveapps.com), which is
very nice *except* they still don't have an Android app to allow mobile
access.

On my phone I've been using an app called Flowzr (it was called
Financisto).   It is brilliant for capturing taxi fares, the dinner bill
etc and even each drink when I'm out.

I just discovered that there is a Gnucash for Android, plus the author of
Flowzr is doing a sync tool....  Hence I've installed Gnucash on all 3
computers and I'm playing with it to learn how to best use it.


My use case is also going to be very different as I operate my businesses
as what I guess you'd call virtual companies.   None of them are actual
registered companies.

I do IT consulting work for a number of companies globally, I run ecommerce
stores and I have other planned income streams.    So I need to track what
I'm spending on delivering the work (paying outsourcers and paying for web
based services such as hosting for each client), I need to bill each client
for work and track what I'm charging them for things like hosting.

I have to deal with at least 4 currencies as I have clients in Moscow (paid
in Euro), Hong Kong and the UK, whilst I live in Bangkok so need everything
in Thai Baht.

So far from what I've seen and read Gnucash can handle everything fine.

I've just done an export to the Android app and it worked fine, then re
import back to my Desktop and it all looks good.   Now I just need to
figure out how to move years of carefully entered financial data from 2
other programs into Gnucash!


And to answer your question about why I don't go online and check the price
of milk....  We don't have online ordering here in Thailand (bit behind in
tech terms sadly)


Appreciate your help and suggestions!

Sean



On 14 October 2014 07:44, Mark Phillips <mark at phillipsmarketing.biz> wrote:

> Sean,
>
> You will end up with a massive chart of accounts....and spend a lot of
> time allocating pennies to different buckets. You may loose site of the
> forest as you count the needles on the pine trees.
>
> You could set up expenses with lots of sub accounts - organized by
> location (restaurant, grocery store, etc) and then specific item (dinner,
> lunch, milk, coffee, etc.). You can go as deep as you want. The advantage
> of this method is you get a roll-up of the totals from the lower levels of
> your massive spending tree.
>
> For example:
>
> Expenses - Groceries - Milk - Safeway, Walmart, Costco, etc.
>
> or
>
> Expenses - Groceries - Safeway - Milk, Coffee, Beans, Tuna
>
> Then, when you enter a Safeway receipt, just pick the Groceries - Safeway
> - Milk account for your milk expense.
>
> All grocery spending rolls up to the top - Groceries, and each sub account
> will roll up with a sub total for Safeway, then Milk.
>
> When you run a P&L report, make sure you tell the report configuration how
> many levels deep you want to display.
>
> I would keep at least a six pack around when you enter the spending
> information......seems very tedious. ;)
>
> It is none of my business, but I am curious why you want to know how much
> you spend on milk at Safeway versus Walmart at the end of the
> month/quarter/year. If you are looking for the best price, wouldn't it be
> easier to check the prices on the Internet before you go shopping?
>
> Mark
>
> On Mon, Oct 13, 2014 at 6:52 AM, Sean Clarke <seanchk at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I'm new to GnuCash having just installed it last night.
>>
>> Already I'm very confused as I can't seem to figure out how I use it.
>>
>> What I want to do is pretty simple (I think), I want to keep track of all
>> my spending so for example today I had my haircut, had some lunch with a
>> friend and then went to the grocery store and purchased a few items.
>>
>>
>> How do I enter a transaction that shows not only how much I spent on lunch
>> but where I ate, so at the end of the month (or whenever) I can see how
>> much money I spent during the period at each different restaurant?
>>
>> How do I record the different items I purchased in the grocery store and
>> which store it was so I can see how much I spend in different stores and
>> how much (for example) I spend each month on Milk?
>>
>> I've managed to do very basic money in / money out transactions but I
>> can't
>> figure out the extra step of linking a transaction to a store (very
>> important) or breaking down a grocery store receipt into items.
>>
>> Is this even possible?
>>
>> Thanks all,
>>
>> Sean
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>
>