Trial Balance Report Showing Net Loss as Profit

1

We have noticed an issue with the Trial Balance report. The system is incorrectly displaying a net loss amount as a profit. The figures under income and expenses are accurate, but the resulting balance is showing a profit instead of a loss.

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2

It is showing the loss correctly as represented by a debit to retained earnings. Only the description is misleading if you expect to see the loss in brackets.

3

In any case, having a total for Profit/(Loss) is a bit misleading for the Trial Balance report.

A Trial Balance report is just a list of the accounts with their balance, debit or credit, at a specific time/day. In the past it was used to verify that all the necessary entries were balanced so that the Total Debit amount = the Total Credit amount.

With the advent of double-entry accounting systems such as Manager this is usually automatic and any invalid entries are posted to a Suspense account.

I note that you have an balance in your Suspense account - this indicates an error in one or more of your entries. The Suspense account should always have a zero balance

4

Although it’s been explained sufficiently by @tony and @Joe91,

The line Net profit (loss) is a correction entry to make sure your trial balance ties in.

You can think of it as an automatic P&L closing entry to this effect:

Account Debit Credit
Retained earnings 100,000
Net profit (loss) 100,000