Issues with an Opening Balance in GnuCash

Mike or Penny Novack mpnovack at mtdata.com
Wed Jun 22 16:25:09 EDT 2016


On 6/22/2016 1:23 PM, John Ralls wrote:
>> On Jun 22, 2016, at 9:58 AM, <fonnique at forpostprod.com> <fonnique at forpostprod.com> wrote:
>>
>> Good Day Alex,
>>   
>> I have an issue with the software not being able to change the opening balance in my balance sheet. Ever since I uploaded my data into GnuCash from 2014 the system generated an opening balance of $ (1,552,869.32) that has not changed in value. Is there any way to allow the system to properly account for this balance?
>>   
>> I look forward to your response.

An opening (negative) balance of $1,552,869.32 in WHAT ACCOUNT?

Look, you say you "uploaded" initial amounts. How? From what source? Was 
the data you uploaded in balance? By "in balance" I mean Assets = 
Liabilities + Equity

Now when I open a set of gnucash books I don't use initial amounts in 
the accounts but have them all be zero (books in balance at this point) 
and then I enter either one (two way split) or since it is simpler two 
split transactions. One for all the debit side balances (the credit side 
is credit to equity and one for all the credit side balance (the debit 
side is debit to equity). I'll know in either case if I made a mistake 
because there would be something left over in the split. But I do not 
doubt that I could have used the "initial balance" method and have had 
it work.

Michael D Novack


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