opening balances - please help

[vicky1306]

Hello

I have just taken over doing the books and the year started 1st April. The company has gone from excel spreadsheets to Sage IA is on CA. Not all OB have been received from the accountant yet so the bank balance and invoices have been entered. The problem I have is that some of them have been entered using the OB so the other half of the transaction has gone into the suspense account and other entries have been entered using the customer/supplier a/c using the date of the invoice, so I have quite a few invoices dated from Jan to 31st March, obviously these are not in suspense a/c.

I need to know what to print out to check the figures in order to

1. clear the suspense account.
2. Do I need to do anything with the transactions which are inputted prior to the year start date as its cash accounting and obviously these invoices have not been paid by us or payments made to us.
3. Do I need to clear the sales & purchase tax accounts, if so how

transactions have been put in for April now and invoices paid so how do I do a report in order to just see what I am supposed to be putting in a journal?

Any plain simple help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[sheelagh]

In answer to your questions
1) Run a nominal activity report for the suspense account for the period ended 31/3/09. This will list all the opening balance entiries - the default detail is "Opening Balance" so they should be easy to spot unless you have changed the detail in the opening balance screen.
2) I guess you posted these prior year transactions so they would be picked up on the VAT return when they are paid. When you post a sales ledger invoice it will post a credit to the sales nominal code. Make sure the accountant knows about this - it could cause some confusion, and it might result in sales being overstated in the TB at the year ended 31/3/10. You could journal this balance DR Sales, CR P&L, but I think you might find that when you get opening balances from the accountant, the balance on the P&L account will be wrong.

You also need to consider the opening balances you posted to the sales ledger.I think you said you are using cash accounting for VAT. The default tax code for sales ledger opening balances is T9 - outside the scope of VAT. This means they will not be picked up on the VAT return after they are paid. One option here would be to calculate the VAT manually and add it to the Sage generated VAT return figures.

3) I can't see why you would want to clear the VAT accounts at the moment. You should post a journal after you have finalised and reconciled each VAT return.
You might also find you have a discrepancy on the VAT accounts after you post opening balances from the accountant.
It's hard to be more specific without seeing the data.

It sounds as if you have got into a bit of a tangle with this and there are some additional implications which you have not mentioned in your post. Send me a pm if you would like more specific help. SMBB specialises in helping with this sort of challenge.

 

[vicky1306]

Thank you for your reply, I think I know what I need to do now but jst to make sure I am getting the data checked by a more experiance BK than me so hopefully I will have more of an understanding.

Thanks again.

 

[Chris1972]

Hi
I'm having a similar problem in that i have taken over the bookkeeping for a local organisation that has been running for several years. I am using sage.
I have posted the opening balances for the three bank accounts (current assets) for the present year and the double entry has been put into the suspense account. Where do i need to journal this to, to clear the suspense account so it reads correct at the year end on the balance sheet ?
Problem is i have no information prior to this mentioned year - just these opening bank balances and the years activity itself.

 

[sheelagh]

Chris, it sounds as if you have just started to use Sage, and you are migrating the accounting system to Sage.
Ideally, you need a closing TB from the previous system. Why is this not available to you?
If you are starting to use Sage at the beginning of a financial year, you will only have balance sheet account entries. Otherwise you will also have P&L balances. Either way, the TB will include the bank balances, and all the other balances you need for a correct opening balance journal. You might find the the TB bank balance differs from the statement balance - you will need a closing bank reconcilliation to identify the difference. If you can't get this, you can work it out yourself by identifying entries posted to last year's accounts which have not yet hit the bank statement.
The Sage help menu will explain how to processs opening balances into your sales and purchase ledger.
If you are taking over at a year end, the accountant will provide the opening balance figures you need. If the previous year accounts are not yet finalised, leave the opening balances for the bank account in suspense for now, and when you get the opening balances, reverse your suspense account entry and post the correct figures.

 

[AATnewbie]

If you are taking over at a year end, the accountant will provide the opening balance figures you need. If the previous year accounts are not yet finalised, leave the opening balances for the bank account in suspense for now, and when you get the opening balances, reverse your suspense account entry and post the correct figures.

Hi there, sorry to hijack this thread ... but I have a similar issue (I think!)

We are in the process of migrating information from Excel to Sage Instant Accounts, and all is going "OK" ... except I have entered the bank's (1200) opening balance as "x" and of course it has posted this into 9998.

What should I be putting as a journal to clear down the suspense account? The money introduced, is what the bank has at hand at the end of the last financial year ..

Many thanks in advance....

 

[AATnewbie]

If you are taking over at a year end, the accountant will provide the opening balance figures you need. If the previous year accounts are not yet finalised, leave the opening balances for the bank account in suspense for now, and when you get the opening balances, reverse your suspense account entry and post the correct figures.

Hi there, sorry to hijack this thread ... but I have a similar issue (I think!)

We are in the process of migrating information from Excel to Sage Instant Accounts, and all is going "OK" ... except I have entered the bank's (1200) opening balance as "x" and of course it has posted this into 9998.

What should I be putting as a journal to clear down the suspense account? The money introduced, is what the bank has at hand at the end of the last financial year ..

Many thanks in advance....

 

[AATnewbie]

If you are taking over at a year end, the accountant will provide the opening balance figures you need. If the previous year accounts are not yet finalised, leave the opening balances for the bank account in suspense for now, and when you get the opening balances, reverse your suspense account entry and post the correct figures.

Hi there, sorry to hijack this thread ... but I have a similar issue (I think!)

We are in the process of migrating information from Excel to Sage Instant Accounts, and all is going "OK" ... except I have entered the bank's (1200) opening balance as "x" and of course it has posted this into 9998.

What should I be putting as a journal to clear down the suspense account? The money introduced, is what the bank has at hand at the end of the last financial year ..

Many thanks in advance....

 

[AATnewbie]

If you are taking over at a year end, the accountant will provide the opening balance figures you need. If the previous year accounts are not yet finalised, leave the opening balances for the bank account in suspense for now, and when you get the opening balances, reverse your suspense account entry and post the correct figures.

Hi there, sorry to hijack this thread ... but I have a similar issue (I think!)

We are in the process of migrating information from Excel to Sage Instant Accounts, and all is going "OK" ... except I have entered the bank's (1200) opening balance as "x" and of course it has posted this into 9998.

What should I be putting as a journal to clear down the suspense account? The money introduced, is what the bank has at hand at the end of the last financial year ..

Many thanks in advance....

 

[Jenni384]

If you're putting in opening balances it should all cancel itself out. Can you not put in the TB as one big journal?

The exception to this will be the debtors and creditors if there are opening balances in individual accounts. In this case use the suspense and that should cancel itself out overall.