Cannot edit opening balance

Carmelo Pagan c.pagan at sbcglobal.net
Thu Dec 14 01:41:03 EST 2017


I guess I stated the issue improperly.  I was trying to edit the opening balance after a reconciliation attempt had failed. The reconciliation difference was exactly the amount of the opening on my paper statement. I then realized I had not entered an opening balance amount (using the opening balances tab) when I created the account.  I then entered an opening balance via the Equity:Opening Balances account. When I attempted the reconciliation, the “starting balance” in the reconciliation window displayed a deficit amount instead of the amount I had entered in the Equity account.

I tried several measures in an attempt to get the negative amount in the reconciliation to reset to the newly entered opening balance. 

These included but were not limited to,.................
1. Deleting the previously entered opening balance, hoping I could return to the original state  Result: Negative starting balance remained unchanged
2. Unreconciled all previously reconciled transactions and reattempted reconciliation. Result: Same Negative balance displayed,
3. Reverted to one of the backup files dated before the first reconciliation. Result: Same Negative amount displayed.

Hopefully this sheds some light on the discussion.

Sincerely , 
Carmelo Pagán 

> On Dec 12, 2017, at 12:52 PM, Carmelo Pagán <c.pagan at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> 
> I thank everyone for their feedback. 
> 
> I resolved it the painful way of creating a new file, downloading my transactions (Thanks to Bruno Acklin's posting of the settings I needed), then establishing the opening balances before reconciling the first time.  Fortunately, I am relatively new to GnuCash, so I only had to go through six months' worth of transactions.
> 
> Lesson learned.
> 
> Carmelo Pagan
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gnucash-user [mailto:gnucash-user-bounces+c.pagan=sbcglobal.net at gnucash.org] On Behalf Of John Ralls
> Sent: Monday, December 11, 2017 6:53 PM
> To: DaveC49 <davidcousens at bigpond.com>
> Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
> Subject: Re: Cannot edit opening balance
> 
> 
> 
>> On Dec 11, 2017, at 2:51 PM, DaveC49 <davidcousens at bigpond.com> wrote:
>> 
>> John,
>> 
>> That is exactly what the Opening Balance dialog actually does in 
>> Gnucash (it creates those entries) and once the entries have been 
>> created they are easily edited either from the Opening Balances 
>> register or from the register for the account for which you set the 
>> opening balance,  just as you can edit any other transaction.
> 
> Yes, Dave, I know. But the OP said that he didn’t use the Opening Balance tab of the new account dialog, he created an Opening Balance transaction by hand afterwards. Since he didn’t use the dialog it’s possible he made a mistake and I instructed him how he might check for one and repair it if he needs to.
> 
> Regards,
> John Ralls
> 
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