General Ledger - Balance Sheet Accruals

A balance sheet is a statement of assets, liabilities and capital of a business at a particular point in time. It is like of snapshot of the health of a business.

From a property point of view in cirrus8 it shows the bank balance, debtors and creditors balances. The cost of the property is not normally included nor is the depreciation of the building and fixtures and fittings as these are normally maintained in the owner’s general accounting system.

Difference between cash and accruals balance sheet

• The cash balance sheet does not show debtors and creditors balances but really only the cash balance, GST accounts and current and prior earnings figures.
• The accruals balance sheet debtors balance should agree with the owners report – tenant balances reports, .e.g debtors details, debtors – summary by account, aged debtors etc. Likewise the unpaid creditors report run at month end should agree with the balance sheet creditors balance.

Balance sheet date

• The balance sheet is always run at a point in time and in cirrus8 can only be run at the end of a month. This is linked to the trial balance whose figures are maintained monthly.

Compare to

• You have the option to show comparative columns for;
  • Previous year, 
  • Last year end, 
  • Previous quarter
  • Previous month.
    Remember though that these will only be accurate if these figures are in cirrus8 and this will depend on when the property was brought on.

Compare periods

• Allows users to choose how many period of comparative figures to show. You can choose up to 11 comparative figure to be shown.

Adjustments to move some expenditure items to the balance sheet, e.g. capital expenditure

• In cirrus8 AP users can only code AP invoices to expense accounts. 

Scenario:

When capital expenditure and petty cash items are coded to expense accounts they appear on the owner expenditure section of Owner Reports.

For general ledger reporting the client requires the items brought across to the balance sheet.

Solution:

Process a GL journal to move the items from an expense account to a balance sheet account.