[GNC] Can a bank account have sub-accounts?

[Peter West]

If you use a variant of envelope budgeting, your actual bank account can be a placeholder account, and every transaction against that account is actually recorded in one of the subaccounts. The total balance of all the subaccounts will show against the placeholder account. By using the OpenSubaccounts item in the menu for the placeholder, you will see a list of all of the transactions in the subaccounts. You cannot edit this list, but you can check the items against your bank statement. If you then uncheck ‘Placeholder account’ you will lose the grand total, but you will be able to edit, hence reconcile, the items in the ‘Open Subaccounts’ transaction display. After reconciliation you can recheck the ‘Placeholder Account’.

I haven’t actually tried this process during reconciliation, but perhaps someone else has, and can give you the pros and cons or suggest an alternative.

—
Peter West
pbw at pbw.id.au
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”




> On 14 Mar 2023, at 12:46 am, Murugan Muruganandam <m.muruganandam at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> hi Mort
> 
> The  expenses account can be granular and can be tracked separately.  for Asset account unless you have separate bank accounts, you cannot separate it in your accounting system.
> You can use sub accounts, but it would be a huge overhead for you to reconcile your bank statement with individual buckets you have created.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Saludos Cordiales
> 
> 
> Murugan
> 
> ________________________________
> From: gnucash-user <gnucash-user-bounces+m.muruganandam=hotmail.com at gnucash.org> on behalf of Mort Q <mortqqq at gmail.com>
> Sent: Monday, March 13, 2023 11:35 AM
> To: Robert Heller <heller at deepsoft.com>
> Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
> Subject: Re: [GNC] Can a bank account have sub-accounts?
> 
> Hi Robert
> I do have lots of expense accounts for repairs, catering, office expenses,
> utilities, etc, and income accounts for fund raising, donations,
> memberships, etc. so we can track income and expenses easily.  The GnuCash
> reports really help people see where money is coming from and going to.
> That's one of the reasons I was thinking of having the sub accounts - the
> bank reports will be like an overall report but with the underlying break
> down of fund allocation.  Does that make sense?
> 
> Every transaction is double entry, I think (one account credited and the
> other debited) e.g. a bill payment will credit Liabilities:Accounts Payable
> and debit Assets:Current Assets:Bank Account.  Is that what you mean?
> 
> Thanks
> Mort
> 
> On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 at 00:05, Robert Heller <heller at deepsoft.com> wrote:
> 
>> At Mon, 13 Mar 2023 23:55:05 +1000 Mort Q <mortqqq at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> Hi all
>>> I act as Treasurer for a community organisation, and want to look for a
>> way
>>> that GnuCash can subdivide the money in the bank account into planned
>>> expenses e.g. a few members do ongoing fund raising for equipment, so
>> could
>>> I make a sub-account of the bank account called "Equipment enhancement"?
>>> When making a deposit, allocate that money to "Assets:Current Assets:Bank
>>> Account:Equipment Enhancement" instead of the currently-used
>>> "Assets:Current Assets:Bank Account".
>>> 
>>> Currently, we just have the one account called "Bank Account" in the
>> Assets
>>> tree, and I keep a separate spreadsheet with the allocation break up.  I
>>> have to remember to do the extra work to keep the spreadsheet up to date.
>>> In my previous life, I learnt that it was better to have a single point
>> of
>>> truth for data.
>>> 
>>> I am thinking I will end up with an account tree like
>>> Assets:
>>>   -Current Assets:
>>>        -Accounts Receivable
>>>        -Bank Account:  (will still need this to be reported on for
>> audits,
>>> etc, as a single account)
>>>              -General Funds
>>>              -Equipment Enhancement
>>>              -Saved for something else
>>>              -etc
>>> Does this make sense?  Or am I missing something?
>>> Or creating a nightmare that will come back and bite me when I try to do
>>> reports, etc later?
>>> 
>>> Clearly, I am not an accountant, and a self-taught GnuCash user.
>> 
>> Clearly :-).
>> 
>> You are not fully understanding double-entry bookkeeping and how GnuCash
>> works
>> and is generally meant to be used.
>> 
>> Yes, you can have sub-accounts under Bank Account, but probably should be
>> looking at creating a budget.
>> 
>> You should *also* create additional accounts for the various expenses and
>> so
>> on as well.
>> 
>>> 
>>> Thanks
>>> Mort
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>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Robert Heller             -- Cell: 413-658-7953 GV: 978-633-5364
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>> 
>> 
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