Using manager since 2017, and really like it, but i wander why the ‘starting balance equity’ (in my case: €3753,57 entered on 1/1/2017) is being kept as a separate item in the summary (and in the equity reports) of the following years.
why is it not settled in with the ending balance of that same year, and (therefore) with the opening balance of the following year (2018), and further on?
Now i have trouble filling in my tax form, because i have to calculate my ‘real’ equity opening balance on 1/1/2018 manually… and I don’t know if I’m 100% correct…
Hopefully there is good reason for this? Can anybody help me out?
I read a few topics on the forum about starting balances, but this wasn’t really discussed.
Thanks in advance.
Kind regards,
Marc
Maybe you could post a few screen images of the figures to make it more concrete - you could always enter a journal entry to transfer values to the Equity account
Starting balance equity is an account Manager automatically creates to force your books to balance when you have made errors in your initial setup. It should never be there and must be corrected. Drill down on it from the Summary to see what makes it up and trace the problem back from there.
Journal entries should not be used to remedy the problem. That will only hide it, not fix it.
The first question is whether you have a start date set? You should only do that if you migrated to Manager from a previous accounting system. Then, all starting balances in Manager should have been set to match (correct) ending balances from the old system.
Go to [Settings] [Starting Balances].
You will see a button [Set Date]. Click on the button and enter the starting date of your administration, like 01-01-2017.
Return to [Settings] [Starting Balances].
You will see a debit and a credit column. You also see the total of these columns.
Calculate the difference of these totals and check if it equales the amount of your [Retained Earnings] in your former administration software.
If so, and [Retained Earnings] in Manager is zero, click on [Edit] and enter the amount which is the difference between the debit column total and the credit column total.
Thank you all.
When I look at the values I entered in the starting balances back in 2017, I can see that the debet/credit columns are not equal… so I think I made a mistake there…
I have to compensate the difference on the credit side and edit the cumulative result of the equity.
But what is the consequence of that edit to my administration until now; i have also a date lock on 31/12/2017…
Regards,
Marc
Entering Starting Balances is unaffected by the Lock Date, but best to remove it before altering Starting Balances.
Edit Retained Earnings or Capital (or both) to insert 3753.57 credit so that the totals at the bottom of Starting Balances screen are equal (4004.57).
Changing Starting Balances will not affect existing transactions.
While transactions after your start date have not been affected, your balance sheets have been incorrect. If that matters, they will be automatically corrected when your starting balances are corrected (if you saved them). If you did not save them, they can be recreated.