[GNC] Tracking UnPaid Bills

[Murugan Mariappan]

The effective date for recording the expense transaction should be based on when the goods or services are received rather than the due date of the bill or the credit period provided by the vendor. This aligns with the accrual basis of accounting, which states that expenses should be recognized in the period in which they are incurred, not necessarily when they are paid.





Saludos Cordiales


Murugan

________________________________
From: Michael or Penny Novack <stepbystepfarm at comcast.net>
Sent: 20 March 2025 13:16
To: Murugan Mariappan <m.muruganandam at hotmail.com>; gnucash-user at gnucash.org <gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
Subject: Re: [GNC] Tracking UnPaid Bills


Answer
I use the business feature, which utilizes three types of dates:
- Bill Date: The date on the bill from the seller.
- Post Date: The date you post the bill into your books.
- Due Date: The date the bill is due. You can predefine payment terms like net 30 or define your own.

When you pay your bill before the due date, the bill is marked as paid (payables will be debited and bank credited. Additionally, GNU can provide alerts to remind you to pay the bill, which can be configured in the settings.


Not really. The reason has to with which YEAR the expense is charged when bills ARRIVE in one year but not DUE until next. Remember, this began with discussing utility bills ("open" account with vendor) so common to RECEIVE bills that are not yet due. Could also be open accounts that are to be paid IN ADVANCE of the expense (like subscribed services)

What date do you use as the effective date of the transaction? In other words, bill arrives on date X, "billing date" Y (when prepared by vendor), bill due date Z. I am not asking about the real time date when you enter into "payables", but what date is assigned to that transaction? << that would be the date in the expense account.

I'm just curious what people are doing.

Michael D Novack