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N/L Accruals

In normal circumstances the full value of each Invoice row is posted to a Sales or Purchase Account when the Nominal Ledger Transaction is generated. However, this might not be appropriate if the Invoice is for a service or contract that is spread over time. In this case, it might be appropriate for the Invoice row value to be posted to the Sales or Purchase Account gradually over the period of the service or contract, especially if that period crosses over into a new fiscal year.

For example, you receive an Invoice for a service contract for one year to the value of 120. You do not want the Purchase Account to be debited with the 120 at once: instead it is to be debited with 10 per month over the year (the contract period). When entering such an Invoice, enter the Code of an N/L Accrual record on flip C (flip B in the case of a Sales Invoice). Records in the N/L Accruals setting are used to define the rules governing the accrual process. When the Invoice is approved, the resulting Nominal Ledger Transaction will post its value to the Accrual Account specified in the N/L Accrual record, not to the Purchase Account. A record is also created in the Simulation register containing the appropriate number of sets of balancing postings (twelve in the example, one per month), each crediting the Accrual Account and debiting the Purchase Account with one twelfth of the total amount (10 in the example). One Nominal Ledger Transaction per month is then created from these balancing postings using the 'Generate N/L Accrual Transactions' Maintenance function. This process transfers the value of the Invoice row from the Accrual Account to the Purchase Account at the rate of 10 per month.

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