Cash Back Rewards

[Adrien Monteleone]

I guess this is a jurisdictional issue, but I would always think of any sort of rebate as a partial refund or discount that was applied or realized after the sale, not income. Income is not “everything that comes in.”

I book all credits and rebates to a pre-paid expenses asset account since they are non-cash assets that I can use for an actual expense later. If the rebate is a one-off refund for a particular purchase, I’ll book it against the original expense since it is most likely tied to it directly. If they are simply a balance reduction on a liability like a credit card, then I would think booking them to a Expenses:Rebates account like John does would make more sense.

For per-purchase rebates like the one described in the OP, one could also I suppose record all transactions with a split using a 'rebate due’ account and discounting the particular expenses directly, and then entering receipt of the rebate against the ‘rebate due’ account.

> On Mar 17, 2017, at 6:27 AM, gnucash-user-request at gnucash.org wrote:
> 
> From: George Riner <georgeriner at mycogeo.com <mailto:georgeriner at mycogeo.com>>
> Subject: Re: Cash Back Rewards
> Date: March 16, 2017 at 4:48:58 PM CDT
> To: gnucash-user at gnucash.org <mailto:gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
> 
> 
> I simply have a rebate account as an income account and whenever I buy something and use a rebate to pay for it that's when the rebate is recognized as income and I charge the expense to that account. 
> 
> So for instance, my Discover card builds up this cash rebate value - then when I buy something on Amazon and use my Discover card rebate, I book the computer part expense (for example) and pay for it with the Rebate acct. When I get an actual cash in my pocket rebate from something I just add to cash and I recognize it as rebate income. When I buy something that has a check from the manufacturer show up weeks or months later, when the check shows up I deposit it in my checking account and recognize it as rebate income. 
> 
> I don't bother tracking my current Discover card cash rebate balance, I only recognize it as income when I actually use it to buy something.
> 
> :George
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