Re: Modification requests

Hi Dee,

On Mon, Jan 9, 2017 at 8:10 PM, o1bigtenor <..hidden..> wrote:

>> 1. Entering an AP invoice - - - there seems to be only 1 item allowed
>> on an invoice. I all too often get invoices with multiple items,
>> occasionally even more than 15 items.
> After a little discussion we are not certain how you are having this
> problem.
> LedgerSMB has from it's beginnings been capable of multiple line items
> per invoice.
> In fact it can handle hundreds of items per invoice, probably thousands.
>

> There are other mechanisms available to do the same as well, such as
> hitting enter from any line item field.
> If you have a concern that your installation is behaving differently,
> please test on our demo system which I just confirmed does work for
> multiple items.
> https://efficito.com/demo

Asked the question because nothing suggests that there can be multiple lines.
Just looking at the 'Add Vendor Invoice' page. There is nothing to suggest that
update does that. Looked in the manual as well and there is no hint that multi-
line is possible. When one knows its possible - - - well then you poke around
differently.

What value would an invoicing system be when it only supports a single line per invoice?!

While I appreciate that you're apparently coming from a different way of working, would you mind phrasing your questions a bit more open? Like "How do I add a second line?" instead of "why is it only possible to add a single line?". It helps me feel more invited to help you.

>> These items can be 1. 0% tax, 2.
>> 5% GST, 0% PST, 3. 0% GST, 8% PST and 4. 5% GST, 8% PST. The last is
>> definitely the most common but the others do show up. Would rather not
>> create a separate invoice for every item (which seems the present
>> method) and the variabilities of the tax system need to be accounted
>> for and tax rules per item would seem to be useful.
> Different taxes can be defined, and then Zero or more can be selected
> when creating/editing inventory items and services.
> These are then automatically selected correctly (per item) when
> generating invoices.
>>
>> 2. There are items where there is a business use of a personal
>> expense. For example gas for my car. The rule (formula that I use) is
>> 80% item personal, 20% item business and the tax(s) get divided in the
>> same way. Is there a some way to create a plug-in that could be
>> called for specific items (say one account #) where such a division of
>> costs is then automatically created.
>>
>> I would enter item as date, gasoline purchased, amount, taxes and the
>> plug-in would then change that so there would be 4 accounts debited
>> rather than just the overt 2.

How does this work in Ledger-cli? Does it allow formulas to split this, or did you build your own scripts around it to make this kind of split?

>> (This kind of thing with different formulas gets used for a number of
>> different things. Think a home office and its attendant costs or share
>> of total costs (electricity, water, waste, heat, interest and
>> communications come to mind) for something very common.)
> This is not something I've needed to do myself.

I would guess then that you are paying more taxes than you need to.

This is a great way of moving household expenses into business
expenses legally.

No doubt that is the case in your jurisdiction, but it's absolutely forbidden in mine (Netherlands), unless very strict conditions apply. Maybe in David's too.

Surprised that this isn't mentioned because I've been using this
expensing since I set it up for my parents almost 40 years ago.
If you are using an accountant for your tax stuff I would ask why they
haven't told you about it. If it is possible in your jurisdiction and your
accountant hasn't told you about it I would suggest that you find a
new accountant!!

Maybe I should find a new jurisdiction to live in :-)

> However there are likely multiple ways of doing this.
> The first one that comes to my mind is to use "Assembly's"
> These are essentially a single representation of multiple items.

As it is a single item that is costed to a number of different accounts I'm
not sure how that would work. Looking at the form right now and see how
it would work well in the combining of things but this is the taking of 1 item
and breaking it into a defined number of accounts. Scratching my head
but not seeing how it would fit.

Doing this would require a new module: cost accounting. Cost accounting is where the costs incurred by a company are being charged to different cost carriers like accounts, departments, etc. Cost accounting usually involves allocation of cost (the formulas you refer to) of a single item to several underlying items. LedgerSMB currently doesn't have it. Implementing it would definitely be an interesting (but non-trivial) challenge.

> Another option would be to apply an AR/AP or GL transaction to move the
> relevant portion of the credit/debit to a different account.

That makes for even more transactions and you would have to do the
modifications manually. Two things I'm not trying to do.

> It's possible that Scheduled Transactions may be helpful here.
Are you meaning 'Recurring Transactions'?

Maybe. There's also "Template Transactions" where the most part of the transaction is pre-filled. You can use it to quickly set up a new transaction.

Looking at a 'General Ledger Transaction' it might be possible to use some
kind of 'Save Template' kind of thing.

Yup. That's what I'm referring to.

In the poking and prodding I'm doing on lsmb I'm finding that it is not
possible to know what fields need to have values and which should be filled
out by the system (consecutive numbering of whatevers) or should be linked to
some other part of the system. No much mention of any of this in the manual
either.

Ok. Document (manual) are you looking at? Or more importantly: which fields would you like to know about?

I am also using lots of electronic transactions. Not sure I want to link things
from banks (really don't trust them much) directly into lsmb. Is there any way
to expedite entering electronic transactions. (Thinking paying a
utility bill, or the automatic insurance or . . . .)

You can upload your bank transactions into LedgerSMB for the purpose of bank reconciliation. There's currently no way to upload bank transactions which are then converted to full AP transactions with payment. It's a functionality I'd *love* to have, but haven't found the time to implement.

> Please continue to ask questions, we will answer as quickly as we are able.
>
> Out of interest, what accounting system are you currently using?

Been using Ledger-cli for a while. Works fine but as I'm looking at something
where I want to off-load the record keeping (I'm starting another enterprise)
Ledger-cli works great as a single user system but its challenging for someone
who isn't into cli and its definitely NOT multi-user.

Thanking you for your assistance and consideration!

Regards,

Bye,

Erik.

http://efficito.com -- Hosted accounting and ERP.

Robust and Flexible. No vendor lock-in.