GnuCash and Swedish accounting legislation

[Wm]

On 19/01/2016 07:33, Larry Evans wrote:
> On 01/18/2016 02:18 AM, Draug wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> For quite a while I've used GnuCash for the accounting of my company,
>> but recently I've come to question if it's legal to use GnuCash for that
>> purpose. According to Swedish accounting legislation, you are not
>> allowed to use accounting software that allows you to edit registered
>> transactions (where they use Excel as an example), which to my knowledge
>> is quite easy to do in GnuCash, even after reconcilation. Swedish
>> accounting legislation requires that every mistake is corrected with
>> another transaction, and that the mistake is left intact in the records.
>>
>> Is there anything that I've missed that makes it possible to use GnuCash
>> in accordance with Swedish law? I really want to avoid switching to some
>> proprietary, cloud-based accounting software that costs $12 a month to use.
>>
>> Yours sincerely,
>> Draug
> 
> What about making the log files uneditable?  IOW, after each session of
> gnucash.  From:
> 
> http://www.gnucash.org/docs/v2.6/C/gnucash-guide/basics-backup1.html
> 
> which says:
> 
> Each time you open and edit a file in GnuCash, GnuCash creates a log
> file of changes you have made to your data file. The log file uses a
> similar naming format as the backup files: .YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.log. Log
> files are not a full backup of your data file - they simply record
> changes you have made to the data file in the current GnuCash session.
> Wouldn't this satisfy the requirement of:
> 
>   Swedish accounting legislation requires that every mistake is
>   corrected with another transaction, and that the mistake is left
>   intact in the records.
> 
> ?
> 
> -regards,
> Larry

Also if one of enterprise capable SQL backends was used and configured
correctly you'd have the same level of transactional logging that Volvo
AB, Ericsson AB, etc have.

Could you change a transaction, yes?  Would it be recorded, yes!  Would
it be easy to mess with the transaction log?  Nope.

But it sounds to me as though the problem isn't a computing or even
accounting one because as Mike has said, there is nothing stopping
someone from opening a new paper journal and re-inventing their
financial world, or, if they have an approved accounting software
package, just buying another PC and recording things as per the accounts
to be filed for the government and one that is real.

This whole thing is so ridiculous I'm surprised there hasn't been a
revolt amongst SMEs and charitable organisations in Sweden particularly
those that have international as well as local reporting requirements.

-- 
Wm