Would anyone care to share how they enter inventory value without using purchase invoices? I have a separate POS system that tracks all my inventory by item, but I don’t want to enter each item into Manager as well. I just want to be able to enter the amount owing on statements I receive from my suppliers, and have the value of these statements provide the value of my inventory. Is this possible?
You have to enter all supplier invoices via Purchase Invoices but you don’t have to enter the inventory detail - if the supplier invoice has 10 inventory items totalling 500, then just enter the Purchase Invoice with a single line for 500, which account you use depends on how you transfer the data from the POS system.
Does your POS system track inventory by value and quantity or does it track inventory by quantity only.
If by value and quantity, then you would post the 500 to a self created inventory account and the data from the POS system would be used to transfer to enter inventory usage from that inventory account to a P&L cost of goods sold.
If by quantity only, then you would post the 500 to a P&L Purchases account - read this topic for a description:
I have often have 25-40 invoices from various suppliers each day, so I can’t enter each invoice, it would take too much time.
Without entering the supplier invoices how do you expect to have any form of accounting controls.
Every business needs to enter their suppliers invoices, even if it means employing someone for just an hour a day - just to do that.
All of those invoices are entered into the POS system, and paper copies are kept on file. I’m not at all interested in hiring someone to enter invoices into an accounting system.
Then
a) what do you need Manager for ?
b) does the POS system manage the supplier accounts - account payable management ?
b) what output does the POS system produce which will allow you to only enter a summary ?
No, it does not manage accounts payable, hence having a separate accounting program. I also need Manager for payroll, tracking expenses, fixed assets, etc. I simply want to enter the statements I receive monthly from suppliers after I have verified all the invoices included in the statement.
Then if that’s what you want, just do that - by using the solutions (Does your POS system track inventory by value and quantity or does it track inventory by quantity only) provided earlier for the non-tracking of inventory.
Since you were quite helpful for my previous question, what would the entry be to account for cost of goods sold? My POS system tracks quantity and value of items sold.
COGS is normally associated with maintaining Inventory Items as it is the process used to transfer the cost of inventory from the BS to the P&L when Inventory is sold.
Therefore COGS is not a natural part of the “Opening Stock + Purchases - Closing Stock” setup.
However, as your POS system tracks the values of items sold you could create an abridged Inventory setup.
- Create via Settings - Chart of Accounts a BS - Asset account called “Inventory/Purchases”
1a) If known, you could enter the “opening stock” as the opening balance. - Create via Settings - Chart of Accounts a P&L - Expense account called “COGS”
- Then when you “enter the statements”, you would add to this “Inventory/Purchases” account.
- Periodically, daily / weekly / monthly, you would create a Journal to deduct the POS COGS from the “Inventory/Purchases” and transfer it to the P&L COGS account.
This setup simulates an Inventory Items system without the need to track individual items which is maintained by the POS system. This also means that the P&L doesn’t require Opening / Closing stock accounts.
Also, the “Inventory/Purchases” account balance would reflect your closing stock value.
@wm55401, a question: Does the POS system tell you the sales and the COGS for those sales for a time period? For example, if the sales were 10,000 for a day, would the POS tell you that the COGS sold for the day was 6,500?
yes, it will do that
So this is what I was trying to do, but when I go to make a journal entry, COGS does not show up as an option to go along with the deduction to inventory.
You seem to be mixing techniques. @Brucanna was explaining a system that would not make use of inventory capabilities of Manager. Yet you mention deductions to inventory. You cannot have it both ways.
And regardless of how you are managing inventory, COGS does not show up on its own. If you are using Manager’s inventory management features, the cost of inventory items sold appears in an automatic account, Inventory - cost. If you are doing things as @Brucanna described, you must create that account on your own, but you cannot then use it with inventory items created in Manager.
Sorry, left that step out, have now corrected the above
I have created both an inventory account and a COGS account separate from the built-in accounts, as I am not using the actual inventory functionality of Manager. However, COGS will not show up for me when I attempt to make the journal entry mentioned previously. I just can’t figure out where I am going wrong in the process.
disregard this, I realized my mistake, sorry and thank you!