I am doing the bookwork for a restaurant and have set up a ‘cash on hand account’ under bank accounts for cash transactions. His accountant does not like the spend money receive money option and would rather I use journal entries. I have already entered a large amount of spend money transactions and do not want to delete these. As we can not use bank accounts in journal entries I would need to set up the cash on hand account as an asset account. Is there any way of transferring the balance from the bank account to the asset account so I can start recording journal entries from now on.
Yes, you can transfer money between a cash account and another asset account you create using a journal entry. But I strongly advise against it, because you would lose all cash account functionality built into the program. You won’t be able to track cleared/pending status on transactions. You won’t be able to use foreign currencies. You won’t be able to import bank statements electronically. And you won’t be able to reconcile your accounts with bank statements.
The purpose of excluding cash transactions in journal entries is to prevent errors. The effect of Spend money or Receive money transactions is the same as a journal entry, though. The same accounts are debited and credited, and the transactions show as debits and credits in those accounts. You just don’t have to remember all the accounting mumbo-jumbo. Manager does it for you.
By the way, the terminology you are using suggests you are using a very outdated version of the program. Bank Accounts is no longer a separate tab. The phrase “cash on hand” is no longer used. All types of cash accounts are now under the single Cash Accounts tab. Update your software, and Manager will make all necessary conversions for you in the database.