[GNC] End of year rollover

[Matthew Andrews]

Hi Adrien,

I just joined this list with the same question.  Great timing!  I like 
your suggestion.  It seems easier than starting a completely new file, 
importing the accounts tree, and entering any starting balances left 
over from the previous year.

It took me a bit of time to figure out how to add a column to the chart 
of accounts.  I found the answer in chapter 10 of the gnucash-guide.pdf, 
in case anyone else is looking.  There's a little down arrow on the top 
right corner of the accounts window that gives more display options.

Adding my thanks!


~Matthew



On 3/20/19 6:36 AM, garage cowboy wrote:
> Thanks for the reply -  and the helpful tips.
>
> regards,
>
> ALT
>
> On Tue, Mar 19, 2019 at 10:42 PM Adrien Monteleone <
> adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
>
>> Welcome to GnuCash!
>>
>> There is a ‘close books’ procedure you can use that zeros expenses and
>> income to equity as ‘retained earnings/losses’ but you don’t have to use
>> it. GnuCash does not require that you clear anything out at the end of the
>> year. (and doing so can impact your ability to run reports in some cases)
>>
>> There are people with 10+ years of data in very large files (with lots of
>> stock tracking) and other than some slow loading times, there aren’t any
>> major issues. (there are work arounds for the slow loading - somewhat)
>>
>> Some people do a close books and open a new file each year. But that
>> process requires archiving reports and the data files. It also means you
>> can’t run reports for multiple years without external help (like from a
>> spread sheet) or you can’t run reports that cross yearly boundaries. (say
>> from 4Q18 to 1Q19) And if you want to look at prior year(s) data, you have
>> to open each of those files separately.
>>
>> The Chart of Accounts tab has an available column for totals that show all
>> data in the entire book. (running totals from when you started using
>> GnuCash) It also has a column you can make visible for totals just for this
>> accounting period. (year) That way you can have an ‘at a glance’ view of
>> your accounts without running Income Statements or Balance Sheets. (but
>> those are available of course if you need them) The Summary Bar also shows
>> current net worth and retained earnings/losses.
>>
>> My personal workflow is to not use the close books procedure, make the
>> current period totals visible on the Accounts tab, as well as keep open a
>> YTD P&L, and a monthly P&L for last month and this month. I run Balance
>> Sheets as needed. I also never close GnuCash except for upgrades. Thus I
>> don’t experience the data file loading but a few times a year. And it is
>> still relatively painless. (special note - loading is significantly slower
>> if you leave reports open when closing the app. They will be loading on
>> re-opening the program which takes some time)
>>
>> As for reconciled transactions, they don’t ‘go away.’ But you can filter
>> your register views if you don’t want to see them. (or any transaction
>> before a certain date, say in the previous year)
>>
>> Regards,
>> Adrien
>>
>>> On Mar 19, 2019, at 5:36 AM, garage cowboy <garagecowboy3128 at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>> Hi   - I am a new gnucash user  ( just a few weeks).
>>>
>>> First of all, congratulations and thanks to all those  who have
>> contributed
>>> to  this great product.
>>>
>>> My question is about EOFY processes   - I am used to products  which have
>>> an end of year rollover process which clears reconciled transactions   -
>> is
>>> there equivalent function in gnucash?  What is the recommended approach?
>>> am wondering  what will happen in a few years  when there are thousand of
>>> transactions in the xml  file.
>>>
>>> Also interested in contributing to the cause  but not a developer.
>>>
>>> regards,
>>>
>>> GC
>>
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