[GNC] How-to question: CD Interest payments deposited in a different account

[Adrien Monteleone]

Art,

Welcome to GnuCash!

Someone more familiar with your exact scenario can help you better, but do you need to record the interest in the CD account at all?

Unless there is a time delay between when it is earned and deposited I’d just record the transaction between an income account and the checking account. If there is a time delay, you could hold it temporarily in the CD, but you could also use some other holding account like an undeposited funds asset account which can also be used for checks received but not yet cashed or deposited.

Regards,
Adrien

> On Feb 18, 2019, at 9:04 PM, Art Chimes <arts.online at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I have been trying to learn GnuCash for several months now, and I am
> apparently dumber than I thought. I am pretty good at keeping my checking
> account, but I find more complex actions more challenging.
> 
> For example, I bought a CD (cert. of deposit) last year, and it resides in
> my brokerage account. Each month it pays me a small amount of interest,
> which is automatically deposited in my checking account. When the CD
> matures I will get my original money back.
> 
> As I learn GnuCash I am still using Quicken (Q 2000!) and in that program
> it is a simple matter there to record the interest+transfer event as an
> IntIncX (interest income transfer) transaction. But I am stymied in an
> effort to correctly record this kind of transaction in GnuCash.
> 
> I have searched GnuCash resources extensively but I keep getting sent back
> to an unhelpful example in which the earnings accrue to the CD, to be paid
> out at the end of the term. (e.g.
> https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v3/C/gnucash-guide/invest_int1.html)
> 
> Do I create a split transaction that shows the interest income increasing
> the value of the CD's asset account and simultaneously being transferred to
> the checking account? I tried this without success, but I am still pretty
> rocky with splits.
> 
> I imagine the procedure is analogous to handling period bond interest
> payments, or mutual fund dividends, etc., but again I am apparently not
> smart enough to find resources that I can use. (It seems the documentation
> — like in Quicken — is not very robust for fixed-income investments.
> 
> I really want to move away from Quicken, but right now I am maintaining
> parallel sets of books as I try to get comfortable with GnuCash. Thank you
> for any help you can provide.
> 
> Art
> 
> PS - I'm a noobie ... please be gentle!
> _______________________________________________