[Advacs-discuss] Advacs accounting system

[Oliver Elphick]

On Mon, 2004-08-09 at 15:36, Helmut Wollmersdorfer wrote:
> > Are you saying it is also standard Australian terminology?  (I suppose
> > the influence of American accounting packages could have made it so
> > here, but I'm old-fashioned and I qualified in 1979!)
> 
> It seems to me, that A/R and A/P are standard terms now. Last year I 
> worked on a large Billing project with a British-Isreal software vendor, 
> and the Britt's only used A/R.

I wouldn't be surprised if they were already starting to do that when I
was training, but I was with a small firm.  I will make sure that either
terminology can be used. 

> > So while the concept may have fallen out of use in many accounting
> > systems, I feel it is useful to retain an understanding of it and it is
> > a useful shorthand for a required entry in the trial balance covering
> > the associated subsidiary ledger.  The alternative to summarising a
> > subsidiary ledger on such a report is to print out every account, which
> > effectively makes the report unusable because of its bulk.  Using the
> > concept of subsidiary ledgers also helps to explain how other modules
> > relate to the General Ledger module.
> 
> Every computerized ledger (that I know) has AR or AP implemented in the 
> GL. AR/AP accounts just get a flag, that they are AR or AP (or more 
> generally of type personal account), with additional fields. They can be 
> treated as ordinary accounts in the base logic, but have special or 
> restricted (for some user groups) logic. Usually they are accumulated to 
> a single AR (or AP) account, which one is configurable, and only 
> displayed in detail on demand.

A control account by any other name is still a control account!

I prefer to define customer and supplier accounts in separate tables,
because there may well be additional fields required specific to each. 
I am using PostgreSQL's inheritance feature, so that "SELECT * FROM
customer" will give you all customer accounts, "SELECT * FROM general"
will give all GL accounts, but "SELECT * FROM account" will give you
both of them and every other kind of account as well.

> In very large companies there can maybe a demand to have a separate 
> AR+Billing+CRM. This can make sense.

I don't understand the distinction you are making there, but I have
never worked for or on the books of a very large company.

My design will accommodate multiple control accounts in (= subdivisions
of) the Sales Ledger (AR); would that cover what you mean?  What
additional attributes would be needed and at what level?

-- 
Oliver Elphick                                          olly@lfix.co.uk
Isle of Wight                              http://www.lfix.co.uk/oliver
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