Seeking advise on setup involving rebates.

[Greg Skelhorn]

 Hello,

I keep records for a volunteer community group. I am neither a bookkeeper nor accountant.

We award grants to other local groups. The local group may pay for their project and submit receipts to be reimbursed or a vendor invoice to be paid directly. We operate completely cashless. We review and approve the receipt or invoice and pass it on for payment from our fund.

Goods and services are subject to a tax (15%).

In many cases a significant portion of the tax paid is rebated. I know the rebate amount upfront, it is a fixed percent when it is applicable. I return the rebate to the local group's pot until the project is completed.

I receive a statement with a simple single line for each transaction that only contains the total.

I want to easily see the total each group has been awarded over their history and current balance.

When done with a spreadsheet I kept columns with:
- cost of goods and services
- tax paid
- tax rebate
- invoice total
- transaction total

An example with a tax rebate:
Group X buys $100.00 supplies
Tax is $15.00
Say rebate is $10.00
Invoice total = $115.00
Transaction total is $105.00

I have tried a few things with gnucash but can't seem to find a good way to set this up.

Currently I have accounts:
Assets:
- Main Account
-- Group 1
--- Group 1 Rebate
-- Group 2
--- Group 2 Rebate

When a grant is awarded I enter a transaction between
Assets:Main Account and 
Assets:Main Account:Group X

Each payment is a split involving
Assets:Main Account:Group X
Expense:Group X
Expense:Tax
Then a transaction:
Assets:Main Account:Group X:Group 2 Rebate
Expense:Tax:Rebate

This works for everything except the transaction total I have on our account statement. I have to calculate that to reconcile the transaction.

This is the end of my first year keeping records in gnucash. Used to be a spreadsheet per year with a sheet for each group. It worked okay as far as setting up the columns but had other issues.

Does anyone have a tip on an easy way to see the "transaction total"? I am open to changing the account structure if that makes it simpler.

TIA

Greg