[GNC] How to enter value when budgeting? And meaning ?

[Adrien Monteleone]

Note, for the curious, I’m aware there is a more direct and technically correct answer explaining the issue with negative signs, but it involves going over the Accounting Equation and how that is implemented using computers, which was not offered by explicit request.

Regards,
Adrien

> On Feb 18, 2020 w8d49, at 1:19 PM, Adrien Monteleone <adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
> 
> Welcome to GnuCash!
> 
> Yes, the Budget module is old and not always intuitive in how it works.
> 
> For starters, what version of GnuCash are you using and on what operating system? (v3.8 is the newest)
> 
> Older versions had some issues respecting your global preference for ‘reverse balanced accounts’. V3.8 should honor this appropriately.
> 
> How you have this set will depend on how you enter figures in the budget module.
> 
> Based on the results you provided it looks like you have the preference set to ‘Credit Accounts’, so most *all* of your accounts will normally show a positive balance.
> 
> Therefore, change your budget entries from negative to positive for all accounts. Then you should see the differences work out properly.
> 
> When budgeting, don’t think of your credits and debits, just think of the absolute (positive) value of the money moving around from income to expenses, assets, and liabilities. There may be times where you would need to enter negative budget value, but that would be very rare.
> 
> Regards,
> Adrien
> 
>> On Feb 18, 2020 w8d49, at 8:01 AM, Long <Phamhoanglongvn at outlook.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Thank you for take your time to read this post and Help me.
>> I'm newbie and not a accounting, and i want to budgeting my income, saving
>> account, expenses, liability and more, but GnuCash Budget make me hard to
>> understand what going on !
>> 
>> For example :
>> *Example 1 :*
>> Income / Revenue : i assume i will have about 100$ for next month, so i
>> budgeting it, and what value should i enter ? 100 or -100 ?
>> Liability (Credit Card): i assume i will make a payment about 100$ a month,
>> so i need enter to budget 100 or -100 ?
>> Saving account : i want to save some money for my birthday party, and it's
>> take 100$ a month, so enter to Assets-saving 100 or -100 ?
>> Expense : i want to spend about 100$ a month to buy foods, so what value
>> should i enter ? 100 or -100 ?
>> *Example 2 :*
>> i assume that i want to reduced the balance of liability and income (because
>> both of them are credit to increase), so i budgeting -100 (mean i want to
>> debit - payment )a month for both. And look ! Booom ...... 
>> 
>> for Liability :
>> Budget : *-100*
>> Actual  :  100
>> Diff      : *-200*
>> for Income :
>> Budget : *-100*
>> Actual  :  100
>> Diff      :  *200*
>> 
>> GnuCash Budget make me very confused, so please help me, or guide me (with
>> non-accounting explain). Thank you
>