Post to Accruals from Purchase Invoice

[Fauxman24]

I have read articles on the above but don’t seem to get a clear picture.
My question is : Having accrued Audit Fees for the previous Financial Year as a liability in the Balance Sheet, (Debit to P&L of course to reflect correct profit) I have now received the invoice from my accountant for those fees. The B/s item “Accruals” does not appear in the Purchase Invoice list. is that right?
(I know I can raise a journal afterwards but that seems clumsy!)
Regards
David

[ian_roberts]

I do it as an auto-reversing journal - debit the P&L code and credit accruals on the last day of one year and auto reverse it on the first day of the next year, then post the purchase to the same P&L code as normal and it balances out to zero.

For custom nominals under assets and liabilities you can use the yellow gear wheel icon on the chart of accounts to enable them for purchase invoices, but that option isn’t available for the standard system accounts such as accruals.

[Fauxman24]

Thank you Ian for your reply. Works fine if you get the purchase invoice in the first month of the new financial year, otherwise my P&L is left with a minus figure for audit fees until the invoice arrives … sometimes into the 3rd or 4th period of the new accounting year.

[ian_roberts]

I guess the auto-reverse date doesn’t have to be the first day of the year, you could just leave it on accruals initially and then set the reversal date for the journal once you know the date of the purchase invoice.

Or create a new nominal (call it something like “accrued expenses”) to use instead of the built-in “accruals” one, so you can post the purchase invoice to that directly.

[Fauxman24]

Thank you Ian. New nominal account coming up. I do find the prescribed nominal a little bit too “fixed”, but I understand this is to help the non-accounts minded people who use the software.