January 9, 2020 at 10:24 pm
x wrote:So can you do this or can't you? The ONLY question you have to ask, is if the OP's design allows negative numbers. If the OP NEEDS to be able to have a negative number in either the credit or debit column, then Joe's assumption fails. If you are writing accounting software, until I'm proved wrong on this, its my view that Joe's model is not only correct, but has efficiencies. Prove me wrong on this and I'll be a fan of yours, but please make it a proof that stands examination.
Still, let me reemphasize, if the original objection had been something along the lines of "the OP probably can't change the database design" then that's something I'd be in agreement with.
Well I won't speak on behalf of the OP, but having spent a LOT of time dealing with accounting and financial feeds, credits and debits these days can have both positive and negative amounts, which as you mentioned would invalidate JC's design. For example, an administrative reversal of certain activities are logged using the opposite sign but in the same debit or credit bucket, as opposed to putting an entry on the other side.
Also - even if you somehow didn't have that behavior, just having the expertise by which you could get the signs right (like scott P mentioned it is not as simple as d=positive and c=negative or the other way around) would require you to be a full on accountant. Never mind the impacts on everything that's been built (journals, reports etc...)
Hey Matt, still interested to hear about the "administrative reversals," but only if it is NOT local to your company. If its just a local thing then never mind, thanks in advance!
January 10, 2020 at 4:12 am
Hey Matt, still interested to hear about the "administrative reversals," but only if it is NOT local to your company. If its just a local thing then never mind, thanks in advance!
These are more industry specific than specific to our company as far as I understand. We're part of a multinational firm publicly traded on the Japanese exchange and get audited regularly by one of the big 5 firms, so we can't be that far off the beaten track.
Again not being an accounting professional myself, just someone with enough knowledge to get in trouble, there are occasions whereby we might need to refuse and/or reverse payments that have been made to us. Application of these payments is done at a line-item level which gets interesting when some of the items represent credits given to the customer (i.e. a negative charge on an invoice). so the charges we charge our customers and be both positive and negative, resulting in payment applications also being positive and negate, as well as the resulting reversals compensating for the original payment pattern.
Trying to trace some of this through cans ugly so putting the offsetting reversal "near" the transactions they are intended to reverse seems to make the reporting and tracing that much easier.
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Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again?
January 10, 2020 at 11:15 am
Trying to trace some of this through cans ugly so putting the offsetting reversal "near" the transactions they are intended to reverse seems to make the reporting and tracing that much easier.
Thanks for posting about it! I would think that encoding an attribute in the sign bit is a bit odd but I wouldn't be in computers if everything had to strictly appeal to my sensibilities!
January 10, 2020 at 11:30 am
Accounting entries are not properly classified simply by a + or - sign. Nearly every financial event in a company ultimately effects some type of accounting entry. An employee taking a day of vacation causes an accounting entry(s). It's just ludicrous to suggest that every time anything happens that a COA would need to be consulted. In fact, traditional accounting entries are never negative, they are simply positive cr or dr amounts.
well when I post a journal entry, I'm going to hope I don't have to somehow guess the account numbers. yeah I know, us idiots are picky like that 🙂
Seriously, nobody's out to rewrite anybody's ERP, and nobody's expecting anybody to demand their organization switch to the "Celko Encoding", so I think you're safe!
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