See what payments apply to which bills

[Adrien Monteleone]

Thanks Geert for that very quick and thoughtful reply.

On 12/22/2015 11:12 AM, Geert Janssens wrote:
>
> On Tuesday 22 December 2015 08:43:44 Webmaster wrote:
>
> > I can't seem to find out which payment was used to pay a particular
>
> > bill.
>
> >
>
> Hi Webmaster,
>
> I'll add some comments and suggestions below.
>
> > I can find and view the bill, but no payment information shows up.
>
> > I can see that it is paid when I search for it, but no payment number
>
> > (such as the check# I entered) shows in the list, nor a payment date.
>
> > I can view a report for that vendor to see a list of all bills and
>
> > payments, but there is nothing indicating which payment applies to
>
> > which bill. (this process is quite cumbersome as are many of the
>
> > business features. It takes entirely too many clicks to get to
>
> > information that should be readily available. I had to figure out
>
> > first that I needed a vendor overview in order to run a vendor
>
> > report)
>
> > I can look at the AP and checking account registers and I see the
>
> > bills and payments but again, no indication which bill any particular
>
> > payment is for.
>
> > I even tried viewing lots, but that didn't help.
>
> Lots will show you, if you know where to look. The lot viewer is not 
> intended for that purpose though.
>
Sorry I didn't click around more before e-mailing the list. Sure enough, 
when I clicked on a bill in the top right pane I was investigating, the 
payment with the number and date showed up in the bottom right.

> >
>
> > When I make payments, I'm entering a check number and choosing
>
> > specific bills to apply that payment to. Yet after payment is made, I
>
> > find no way to see that information anywhere. This is particularly an
>
> > issue when I receive account statements from vendors and I want to
>
> > verify that certain bills on it have been paid. Knowing which check
>
> > was issued for that particular bill, I can see if it cleared my bank
>
> > and inform their AR department of the discrepancy. Using the payment
>
> > amount is not always possible because we frequently bundle bills and
>
> > pay them with a single check, or pay from statements. Vendors who
>
> > offer discounts also usually report the original amount on their
>
> > statements, yet my checks are for the discounted amount, so that will
>
> > never match. I guess this isn't a big deal for people who write a
>
> > handful of checks each month, but as soon as you get to several dozen
>
> > a week, not having easy access to this info is an issue. I can't
>
> > imagine how a company issuing hundreds or thousands of checks a month
>
> > manages to reconcile and verify everything.
>
> They probably wouldn't be using gnucash in the first place, which is a 
> tool for personal accounting and small businesses :)
>
Fair enough...
>
> > Perhaps I'm just not
>
> > looking in the right place. Any help would be appreciated.
>
> >
>
> > Or maybe this feature does not yet exist?
>
> It does exist: open any invoice report on your bill(s) and modify it 
> to display the payments for that bill.
>
Unfortunately, while it does show the payment(s) and the date(s), it 
does not show the check number. So I'm left with viewing lots.
>
> I do agree this is not the most obvious place to look for it and still 
> not really efficient. Where would you have expected to find this 
> information ?
>
Perhaps when viewing a closed (or partially closed) invoice/bill, the 
payment info would be on that screen without having to guess you need to 
view a report on it. Maybe in the upper right area since the notes 
section is so large, or maybe as extra entries on the bill/invoice 
itself. (not sure if that's wise, or if they should be editable or not 
after unposting) But that screen was where I was expecting to see it.
>
> I'll add that most accounting packages I have used for my own business 
> are equally vaque with regards to which payment was for which bill. It 
> seems to me accounting is more concerned with the net balance for a 
> vendor than for specific bills individually.
>
> And I believe the business features in gnucash were originally written 
> from that mindset.
>
> >
>
> > I do see that I can enter a memo, and as a test when I paid a bill, I
>
> > entered the invoice # there and now, when I look at the vendor report
>
> > or register, it shows up. One would think if you have to select a
>
> > bill to mark it as paid, GC would tag the payment with the bill
>
> > number(s) for reference automatically.
>
> Gnucash does it the other way around via lots. A lot unambiguously 
> ties one bill to one or more payments. If you pay multiple bill with 
> one payment, there will be as many lots as there have been bill paid.
>
> > It would also be helpful when
>
> > searching for a bill, that the listing contained additional columns
>
> > for payment number and payment date if the bill is paid. That would
>
> > save the several steps of having to run a vendor overview first and
>
> > then a vendor report for a particular vendor and then trying to match
>
> > up payments.
>
> This all assumes there will only be one payment associated with a 
> bill. That's not necessarily so in GnuCash. One bill can be paid by 
> several (smaller) payments. So one can't just to add that one single 
> payment number in a column in the search results all the time.
>
> And in case multiple payments were used to pay a bill, which date 
> would make sense as "the payment date" ? The first payment, or the 
> last one ?
>
> And finally there may also be bills that are only paid partially at 
> some moment in time. How should gnucash treat these ? Paid, unpaid ? 
> With a payment date or not yet ?
>
Face palm. Sorry I didn't think of those cases first. Certainly, a mess 
would result.
>
> While the initial suggestions are a good start, some more thought is 
> required before this would make sense. (And someone should still be 
> available to actually implement it of course).
>
> >
>
> > If there is a better place to make a feature request, please advise.
>
> Strictly speaking we do have a place for feature requests:
>
> http://gnucash.uservoice.com/forums/101223-feature-request/
>
> I will admit this forum is getting less attention than it really 
> deserves (also from me :( )
>
> So for initial discussion I would propose the gnucash-devel mailing list.
>

Thank you again. I'll think some more and flesh out a more detailed 
request probably based on seeing the info in the invoice/bill itself.