I would like to isolate a series of revenue and expenses in Manager. Quickbooks uses “classes” for this purpose. Does Manager have a way to classify transactions, similar to classes, so that you can isolate revenue and expenses for a segment of your business? If not, is there a workaround?
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You should read the guide on building a chart of accounts - https://www.manager.io/guides/9181
Manager has two modules that would be equivalent to classes in Quickbooks.
- Divisions (Create and manage divisions | Manager)
- Projects (Create and use projects | Manager)
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great. Thank you. I will read the guides.
I read this guide when I set up my COA. The chart of accounts is not my issue. Someone referred me to divisions and projects and this may be the answer I am looking for. Thank you for your response.
Thank you for letting me know. Manager is a great software. I rarely have to consult the forum because it works so well and the guides are very well written.
I thought you may be interested in this article I wrote in my blog about my conversion from QB to Manager.
https://medium.com/@lianabeloliver/hostage-no-more-why-i-stopped-using-quickbooks-83a8d40bb522
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@lianabel
Great QB conversion tips! Wanted to offer one more solution for those who don’t want to use the “interbank transfer” feature. (A side benefit of this option is you won’t have to delete and re-enter cr.card payments!):
Create a transfer account (aka. a “link” account) that should always have a zero balance. Then apply both the checking credit (for cr.card payment) and the cr.card (debit) to this account so that it stays at zero.
Note: That’s how I always did it with QB desktop! (Using a “Link-Sync” account avoided a lot of problems.) FWIW, didn’t do this with the online version. Always had issues there.
PS: Manager.io is SO MUCH BETTER imo!
@WLS, you seem to be referring to inter account transfers (Manager’s terminology). Honestly, I can see no reason for avoiding them. In fact, if you use more than one bank or cash account, avoiding them invariably involves more work than using them.
Once you accept the fact that you should be using inter account transfers, you can automate the entire process using imported bank statements. The clearing account technique you describe is covered by the Guide: Post inter account transfers from imported bank statements | Manager.
Terminology is a problem here.
I guess most Manager users
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have more than one physical bank account outside of Manager.
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sometimes transfers money between those bank accounts.
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find bank imports into Manager an efficient method of getting accurate financial transaction data into Manager.
Assuming the above that unfortunately means the current implementation of the “Inter account transfer” built into Manager (the Inter account transfer module/tab) is not usable. The issue being
- data sufficient to define the transaction will be imported from the bank imports from both physical/ external bank account.
- neither allow a Manager bank rule to create a Manager inter account transfer transaction
- Manager’s has limited transaction matching abilities which is likely to result in duplicate inter account transfers transactions in Manager if bank rules allowed creating inter account transfers.
The current solution is to give up on Manager’s built in inter account transfers module/tab and handle inter account transfers between external physical bank accounts “manually”. By manually I mean:
- disable Manager’s inter account transfer tab
- create a clearing account for inter account transfer.
- create bank rules to post all inter account transfers to that account.
I think that is what both @WLS and @Tut were saying. The poor work flow of Manager’s inter account transfer tab when bank imports are used does sadden me as I thought the tab was a good idea. Unfortunately the current implementation is not really useable for most users.
I also am having a problem with some of the terminology used.
When you refer to external physical bank accounts outside of Manager I envisage that Manger is set up for business accounts and includes the business bank accounts and then you may have personal accounts which would not be set up in Manager. These personal bank accounts I would refer to as “external physical bank accounts outside of Manager” and so inter account transfers are not relevant for transfer between business accounts and personal accounts.
Very true. Such transactions can only be receipts or payments, generally posted to equity accounts.
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By physical external bank accounts I was referring to a non Manager entity which in my experience both businesses and people have more than one (Credit cards, trading account, savings account, different bank or investment institutions).
These external bank accounts are typically each represented within Manager each by a different Manager bank account.
As a result when Manager is used for a business or personal accounting records the Manager businesses will typically have more than on Manager bank account representing the associated external physical bank accounts.
Both businesses and individuals often transfer money between that entities external bank accounts. Because entities commonly transfer money between that entity’s external bank accounts, it’s desirable Manager can readily handle such transactions using the normal data transfer protocol (bank imports) and Managers Bank transfers module/tab.
I use Interbank transfers to record payments to my VISA account, which I have setup as a control account. It works great! When I import my bank statements, I delete the payment transaction and record it as an interbank transfer.
Thank you for this suggestion. I will try it.
Inter account transfers tab will get better. The idea is that there will be a workflow to convert a payment and receipt into an inter-account transfer transaction.
@Patch
“A clearing account!” Exactly what I was referring to. And this solution works flawlessly imo. - Not only in Manger.io but also in QB (desktop) and most other personal and business financial platforms.
With bank rules, this work-around can handle “inter account” transactions without any additional steps in Manger.io… All you need to do is make sure the “transfer” account maintains a zero balance. Have used this process with QB desktop for over a decade.
Note: Chose NOT to use this method with QB online (different business) and frequently ran into unexpected consequences/inconsistencies.
Hi Tut - “Inter-Account” transfers… That’s exactly what I was referring to.
Using “linking accounts” works great IMO. (Been doing it that way for over a decade on other platforms.) Combined with bank rules it works fine here too!
Yes, as explicitly instructed in the Guide.
Thanks for the link to your article, which I found helpful since I’m in the same position (long-time QB user thinking about converting) that you were in when you started your process, @lianabel .
That being said, I don’t actually see the answer to your original question in the article or on the thread. There was a suggestion at one point that “projects” and “divisions” are both equivalent. It seems to me that “projects” in Manager maps to “Jobs” in QB almost perfectly, and that is definitely different than a QB “class.” The Manager “divisions” seem like they are different than anything in QB, including classes. Not necessarily better or worse, just different. (For example, there’s this old thread where there’s a longish, and I think unresolved, discussion about differences: Added ability to create divisional balance sheet - Manager Forum)
As a QB convert, I’d be interested to know what you found.