Feature Request: Open-Item Management / Reference Clearing for Special Accounts

1

The Problem:

Currently, Manager.io enforces a strict separation between Customer and Supplier. In addition, only the transactions like Sales Invoice and Purchase Invoice can be linked to Receipt, Payment, Credit and Debit Memo. When dealing with entities that act as both a customer and a service provider (e.g., Amazon Marketplace, where sales occur but advertising expenses are deducted directly from individual settlements), there are tradeoffs when designing the accounting flow.

Consider the scenario where:

  • Sell on Amazon Marketplace (revenue)
  • Run campaigns via Amazon Advertising and receive invoices periodically (expense)
  • Settle accrual at Amazon Advertising via offset of payout from Amazon Marketplace

Using Sales Invoice with negative amount or Purchase Invoice will pollute the A/R and A/P Aging Reports. Instead, we can post deduction amounts to a Special Account under liability via Journal Entries, but we lose the ability to track “Paid / Unpaid” states on individual invoices.

Proposed Solution:

Introduce an “Open-Item Management” or “Reference Clearing” checkbox for Special Accounts

When enabled on a Special Account

  1. Unique Reference Enforcements: Every debit and credit to this account would allow a Reference to be entered just like posting to Accounts receivable and Accounts payable control account.

  2. Matching / Clearing Interface: Receipt and Payment with valid Reference will match against the original transaction posted to the Special Account. If only the Special Account is selected but no Reference is entered, it will behave the same as A/R and A/P to settle the oldest incomplete transaction first.

  3. Uncleared Items Report: allow Advanced Search functionality to filter for different statuses in Special Accounts.

Benefits:

  • Aligns with Existing Manager Logic: Manager uses transaction line matching already for the majority of the functions, extending this to Special Accounts makes the functionality more complete.

  • Compliance: It allows for gross presentation under accounting standards without modifying the Customer/Supplier separation.

  • Flexibility: Enables Special Accounts to truly function as a lightweight auxiliary ledger for any type of clearing account, transit account, or employee expense reimbursement pool.