[GNC] Income not appearing in P&L report

[Michael or Penny Novack]

> I get reimbursed  a certain amount of electricity costs each month, as 
> a separate transaction in to my bank a/c. I enter them as 
> income:reimbursement in the gnucash transaction.
>
> However, nothing appears in my P&L report under 'reimbursement' but if 
> I click on the headline in the report they all appear on the list of 
> reimbursements as assets:BoIBarry as entries under 'transfer'  (where 
> BoI Barry is my bank a/c)
>
> Why?

Two problems here, only one of which is gnucash

1) Reimbursements should be considered reduction of the expense rather 
than income. Eventually somebody else paid this portion of your 
expenses, not you. This is a matter of accounting, independent of gnucash

If you need to track pending reimbursements (to make sure you receive 
them) you can do it this way: Let's say because of "work at home" your 
employer is paying 10% of your electric bill: (by which I mean YOU pay 
the electric bill, submit a reimbursement request, and receive a 
reimbursement)

a) You pay an electric bill:  This would be a split transaction, credit 
your bank account for the payment and debit 90% to electricity expense 
and 10% to pending reimbursements << that would be an asset account -- 
somebody owes you something, the origin of the term "debit" >>

b) Your employer reimburses you:  Debit the bank account and credit 
pending reimbursements. Notice that the balance of pending 
reimbursements shows you what is outstanding (reimbursements you have 
not yet received)


2) BUT --- you claim to have  gnucash problem with some income or 
expense account not showing on your P&L report (has various names for 
essentially the same report). You need to check report options. The most 
likely reasons for an account to be missing in this report:

a) You are applying explicit selection as to what accounts to appear. If 
you aren't explicitly specifying accounts, it isn't the cause

b) You are suing the option "do not show accounts with zero balance" AND 
there were no transactions affecting this account DURING THE TIME 
INTERVAL OF THE REPORT. There is always a time interval for this report.

Michael D Novack