[GNC] Getting My Account To Trial Balance

Thu Jul 26 00:56:23 EDT 2018

I’ll give 3.3 a try and test. I seem to recall this error in the past and then it was working again because I recall helping someone hunt down an issue with this report in April or May. (I was supposed to file a bug report on how foreign currency balances are calculated for the report, but I think Christopher Lam's upcoming report changes are going to render that moot)

Regards,
Adrien

> On Jul 25, 2018, at 11:21 PM, David Carlson <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> David T,
> 
> Yes, I trade securities and GnuCash can handle my books as well as it can a very simple set of books.
> Shug had indicated in an earlier message that in this case there was only one currency and no securities and Adrien and I were trying to tailor our answers to his case.
> 
> David C
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Jul 25, 2018, 8:51 PM David T. <sunfish62 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> David,
> 
> I imagine that the number of GnuCash users who only have accounts in a single currency (i.e., without any investments in stocks, mutual funds, or other commodities) is probably pretty small.
> 
> For those who *do* have such holdings, a balanced transaction will still fail the trial balance if the gain or loss isn’t entered. In this instance, there will be no entries in IMBALANCE-XXX, since each transaction balances. Example: buy 10 shares of X for $100, using cash from your checking account (credit/debit of $100). Then sell those shares for $150 (debit/credit of $150). Both transaction balance—but where did that extra cash come from? Without entering the gain of $50 as income, the Trial balance will fail. You can enter that gain manually, or use trading accounts or the scrub lots feature to help manage this.
> 
> David T.
> 
> On July 25, 2018 at 7:45:10 PM, David Carlson (david.carlson.417 at gmail.com) wrote:
> 
>> I have no experience with release 3.2 or with High Sierra, so I hope others
>> can help Shug with reports.
>> 
>> As Adrien Monteleone and David T both point out, the Trial Balance report
>> may be of little or no value to users who only use one currency and do not
>> buy or sell stock or other commodities. You could probably skip that
>> report altogether.
>> 
>> GnuCash forces every transaction to either be a perfectly balanced double
>> entry transaction in one currency or it automatically adds one of the two
>> accounts that Adrien Monteleone mentioned. When those are equal to zero,
>> your books are balanced
>> 
>> The Trial Balance report is for users with more complex needs.
>> 
>> David C.
>> 
>> On Wed, Jul 25, 2018 at 6:05 PM, Adrien Monteleone <
>> adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
>> 
>> > I get that same error. (MacOS High Sierra, GnuCash 3.2)
>> >
>> > My suspicion is misconfigured report options, but I’m not familiar with
>> > the report enough to know which one(s). I never bother with this report
>> > because I don’t use the Close Books function. I also don’t really
>> > understand it’s purpose with a perpetual system in light of the existence
>> > of the orphan-xxx and imbalance-xxx accounts. If those are both zero, how
>> > does one still need to adjust anything before closing books?
>> >
>> > Regards,
>> > Adrien
>> >
>> > > On Jul 25, 2018, at 5:49 PM, David Carlson <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com>
>> > wrote:
>> > >
>> > > That is a bird of a different feather. Then it will help to know which
>> > > release you are using and what operating system your computer has,
>> > because
>> > > the solution may be to switch to a different release or to try some more
>> > > complex debugging if you are up to it.
>> > >
>> > > Do include gnucash-user at gnucash.org in every reply so other users see
>> > the
>> > > comments.
>> > >
>> > > David C
>> > >
>> > > On Wed, Jul 25, 2018 at 3:13 PM, H M MacDonald OBE <
>> > sassunachobe at gmail.com>
>> > > wrote:
>> > >
>> > >> Hi David/Richard
>> > >>
>> > >> The error message is as follows:
>> > >>
>> > >> *Report error*
>> > >>
>> > >> *An error occurred while running the report.*
>> > >>
>> > >> It doesn’t give any clue as to what’s wrong.
>> > >>
>> > >> Thanks.
>> > >>
>> > >> Shug
>> > >>
>> > >> From: D <sunfish62 at yahoo.com>
>> > >> Date: Wednesday, 25 July 2018 at 20:33
>> > >> To: David Carlson <david.carlson.417 at gmail.com>, Hugh MacDonald OBE <
>> > >> spahonsecobe at gmail.com>
>> > >> Cc: Gnucash Users <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
>> > >> Subject: Re: [GNC] GETTING MY ACCOUNT TO TRIAL BALANCE
>> > >>
>> > >> Shug,
>> > >>
>> > >> I would ask you to tell us what error message you have received, since I
>> > >> don't usually see any error messages when I run this report. (I do have
>> > >> trouble getting this report to balance, however).
>> > >>
>> > >> However, David has made useful advice regarding tracking transaction
>> > gain
>> > >> or loss; I would add that in Gnucash, a commodity is a broadly defined
>> > >> concept, and covers anything you have that is not counted in your
>> > default
>> > >> currency.
>> > >>
>> > >> In other words, stocks, mutual funds, as well as accounts denominated in
>> > >> another currency will all fall into this category, and any time you
>> > have a
>> > >> transaction involving thread accounts, you will need to account for
>> > gain or
>> > >> loss hidden in the conversion.
>> > >>
>> > >> David T
>> > >>
>> > >> On July 25, 2018, at 1:52 PM, David Carlson <
>> > david.carlson.417 at gmail.com>
>> > >> wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >> I assume that you mean the debits do not equal the credits rather than
>> > that
>> > >> GnuCash failed to generate the report.
>> > >>
>> > >> This is commonly the result of selling a commodity for a different price
>> > >> than what was originally paid without correctly accounting for the
>> > profit
>> > >> or loss. One technique to close in on a transaction contributing to the
>> > >> difference is to include a shorter time period in the report until the
>> > >> values do balance. Once the date is determined, look for a commodity
>> > >> transaction that is not balanced by a profit or loss.
>> > >>
>> > >> David C
>> > >>
>> > >> On Wed, Jul 25, 2018 at 12:20 PM, H Millar MacDonald OBE <
>> > >> spahonsecobe at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >> Hi
>> > >>
>> > >> I¹ve just become involved with GnuCash 3.2 and set up my first accounts
>> > for
>> > >> our club. It all looks okay except and will provide a profit and loss
>> > >> report on Income and Expenditure which is good. However, when I try to
>> > >> get
>> > >> a Trial Balance I get an error message which according to Google seems
>> > to
>> > >> be
>> > >> quite common. I don¹t know where to start to fix this. Can anyone
>> > offer
>> > >> any advice please? I am an absolute novice at all of this so please be
>> > >> patient with my request.
>> > >>
>> > >> Many thanks.
>> > >>
>> > >> Shug
>> > >>
>> > >>
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