I’m hoping someone can help with a Major issue that has shown up at some time in updates over the last 12 months.
We have hard copies of our P&L from previous years and we use the lock date at each EOFY. However when we now run the P&L the figures for Inventory cost have changed in a very significant way, in most cases more than doubled for all previous years.
To verify i have restored an old backup from previous financial year into the current version of manager to check it wasnt something I inadvertently did… and its figures are way out compared to the hard copy also…
Obviously something has changed in the way inventory cost is calculated in an update in the past 12 months…
What I am extremely concerned about is that manager has somehow changed data previous to the lock date! Surely this should not be possible?
I would love to try and older version of manager but cannot find them to download anywhere
Struggling to try and get to the bottom of what has happened… Any assistance very welcome as I am struggling to pin down the cause.
Your tale of woe is worrisome, but so far only a story. You need to post screen shots of Edit screens for transactions you believe are being improperly reported. Pick an inventory item and show us the transactions contributing to its average cost. Drill down on the Inventory- cost account and show what is being reported.
Not a single other person has reported such a problem, so I suspect this has something to do with the way you are entering transactions.
Ok so I removed the latest version of manager and went back to version 20.7.44 and restored my data from end of may 2020 to match the version of the software. The data for inventory cost on the P&L matches perfectly with the hard copy…
SO then i updated manager to the latest version and BOOM… figures are outrageous and more than doubled instantly in the exact same report!
See below… Same report 10 mins apart…same database only difference was upgrading the version of manager to the latest from the older version listed above.
Is there something in the database upgrade process doing this??
and again my question is why is data that should be locked being changed? you can see even the comparative data from the previous year has changed also! This should not happen surely.
@lubos Is there something in the database upgrades in this period that would cause this… I mean its entirely possible that it is something I have been doing wrong but with the test i did above it would appear that something is changing the data without any user input… A very strange and considerably concerning thing for an accounting program I’m sure you would agree.
While showing images of your P & L is interesting and illustrates the problem, it does not help in diagnosing what is wrong.
The only way to do this is as Tut suggested - >
Pick an inventory item and show us the transactions contributing to its average cost. Drill down on the Inventory- cost account and show what is being reported.
OK… In what version of manager??? I have clearly demonstrated that manager IS changing data when upgrading versions of manager… so the behaviour of manager in generating the P&L hs clearly changed at some point and is changing past data… IT should not be doing that.
Sorry but with NO data changes… the only thing im doing is upgrading the version of manager… the report data is changing… That should not be possible… NO date changes No transactions added simply upgrading manager…
This is affecting ALL INVENTORY Items when sold, as this is when the cost is applied
Happy to provide exactly what you and @tut are asking for but perhaps you can be clearer on exactly what you are asking for.
Pick an inventory item and drill down on its cost in both versions to discover where the difference on average cost is coming from
Once this has been found, then an analysis can determine what has caused it.
Only going back and examining the average cost from the start in both versions will highlight this.
Looking the the total cost of sales is of no use in diagnosticating the cause
Unfortunately, this could be quite a tedious check depending on the number of entries for the inventory items but you are the only person who can do this as you have access to the data
So the issue is now clear, it appears there has been a change to how manager handles selling inventory at 0 cost and how that reports on the P&L See attached images, the one from the old version shows very few transactions, in fact only the transactions that have been the item invoiced at cost. wheras the current version shows all items billed at 0 cost or otherwise…
The back and forward consequences of this are not very fun!
I think you misunderstood. Above is axactly that. 2 computers wit 2 versions. Same data file.
You can see the issue clearly with a single inventory item shown. The bottom image is from the older version. The upper images are from the current version.
My reference was in relation to the tax and reporting implications of years of incorrect previous data… and the ongoing issue of how to move forward.
That is the crux of the issue. My understanding is Managers inventory reporting has been improved so it is more accurate. So moving forwards, the new calculation is preferred.
For substantiation of old data, just keep a copy of the old Manger program with your data back up. As you are now wary, when saving important backups, include the Manager program version number in the file name eg “My business name (8/05/2021) Sent to My Accountant FY2020 v21.4.88.Manager”
As for how to report the revaluation on inventory. If you can see it is more accurate then transitioning to the more accurate figures makes good business sense.
But the implications here are fairly far reaching. Especially for a small business. With returns for years now being incorrect as well as partners returns now also being incorrect for years.
It appears to be a very large fundamental and damaging error reaching back a long time. While the cause seems now clear and a fix was obviously implemented last year that really isn’t going to help much with the expense reporting loss now incurred.
It also means the lock date feature is completely useless if updates are going to change data in reports… although it is what led to to finding the issue.
I assume you must mean zero price, because you cannot specify inventory cost when selling it. The posting to the Inventory - cost account happens automatically based on current average cost of the item. Please confirm—unless you meant something else.
It is not. The actual numbers in reports are not stored in your data file. Only the report definition is stored. The numbers are calculated on the fly every time the report is viewed. There is something about the way you entered the transactions (which are locked) or defined the reports that is causing the change. That is why I asked to see Edit screens of transactions involved.
It does not matter, because your transaction data will be the same in all versions.
No, you have not. As stated above, you have only demonstrated that different installations of the program are processing the same data differently. That could be because the reports are defined differently in the two installations.
The first portion of this statement is true. The second is not. That will be key to understanding your problem.
In all this discussion, there are three important things that have not been mentioned:
Are both versions of the data file and the P&L Statement set up on the same accounting basis? For one screen shot, you showed enough of the P&L Statement to see it was on cash basis. On all others screen shots, you did not include that portion of the report. Accrual and cash basis accounting will produce different balances for Inventory - cost.
You have shown drill-downs on the Inventory - cost account. But you have never shown transactions contributing to the average cost of an inventory item, which is what I originally requested. For that, you have to look at the purchase history of the item.
Related to #2 above, you have stated several times you are selling items at zero cost. I asked for clarification about that. But I must note that your drill-down on the Inventory - cost account shows no zero-value entries. Nor should it, because your inventory items have cost whether you charge for them or not. Again, this is why it is important to see the Edit screens of actual transactions, not drill-downs from reports.
