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Opening Balances in the Sales Ledger - and the Nominal Ledger

You should enter Sales Ledger opening balances in the form of Invoices and Receipts. Any Invoices and Receipts from the previous fiscal year that you enter should not be posted to the Nominal Ledger if you have already entered previous-year Nominal Ledger opening balances to the Brought Forward Balances setting and Simulation register as described here. The Nominal Ledger opening balances include balances for the Accounts affected by Invoices (e.g. the Debtors Account) and so to post to those Accounts from opening balance Invoices is to post the same amounts twice. Therefore, before you can enter your Sales Ledger opening balances, you need to ensure that Invoices and Receipts from the previous fiscal year will not update the Nominal Ledger.

Using the [Switch Module] button in the Navigation Centre, ensure that you are in the Nominal Ledger. Click [Settings] in the Navigation Centre or use the Ctrl-S/⌘-S keyboard shortcut. In the subsequent list, double-click 'Sub Systems'. The following window appears:

Tick the boxes to indicate which records ("Sub Systems") are to update the Nominal Ledger automatically, and specify dates when that updating should begin. In the illustration, for example, we have specified that marking an Invoice dated later than 1/1/2015 as OK and saving will cause a Nominal Ledger Transaction to be created. This Transaction will update the Nominal Ledger by debiting a Debtor Account and crediting a Sales Account and, if appropriate, a VAT Account. If the Invoice is dated earlier than 1/1/2015, a Nominal Ledger Transaction will not be created and so the Nominal Ledger will not be updated. We have also specified that the other Sub Systems should behave in the same way.

It is recommended that for each Sub System you enter the first day of your fiscal year. When you enter previous-year opening balances, use a date prior to the Sub System date. This will ensure that Nominal Ledger Transactions will be created when expected and that they will not be created for opening balances. If it takes longer than expected to enter opening balances, you can continue doing so and start to create new records without needing to worry about the consequences in the Nominal Ledger. For example, you can enter previous-year Invoices and Receipts (dated prior to the dates in the Sub System setting) at the same time as issuing new Invoices. The Sub Systems setting will ensure the Nominal Ledger is only updated when it should be.

If you are starting to use Standard ERP in the middle of a financial year, you should already have entered the Nominal Ledger Transactions for the current year so far, as described here. If, as was recommended, you entered these from the original documentation and did not copy them from Transaction Journal reports produced from your old system, you will not have any current year Transactions that relate to the Sales or Purchase Ledger. These will now be created automatically from the Invoices and Receipts (and Purchase Invoices and Payments) that you are about to enter, providing that they are dated later than the Sub System date (the first day of your fiscal year). If you did enter current year Transactions relating to the Sales or Purchase Ledger as part of the previous exercise, you will not want them created again when you enter Invoices and Receipts. In this case, make the Sub System date later (a few days before the date when you will start originating transactions in Standard ERP). This means you will be able to enter Invoices for the current year to date and to issue new Invoices simultaneously without needing to worry about the consequences in the Nominal Ledger.

If you are not certain whether you have entered current year Transactions relating to the Sales or Purchase Ledger, produce a Trial Balance report for the current year and check the balances for your Sales, Purchase, Debtor and Creditor Accounts. If these are zero, you have not entered these Transactions. If they are the same as those on the Trial Balance produced from your old system, you have entered these Transactions already. Please refer to this page for instructions about printing a Trial Balance report.

Once the Sub Systems setting is to your satisfaction, save and close the window by clicking [Save] in the Button Bar.

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Note that if you have entered previous-year opening balances in the Nominal Ledger, you should not post any Sales, Purchase or Stock opening balances to your Nominal Ledger. To do so will duplicate the work you have already done and will immediately render your accounts inaccurate.

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