Acumatica Chart of Accounts has an account field for your main, or natural account number. Then if you want to tag that transaction with another dimension, Acumatica has subaccounts. The advantage of having a separate Chart of Account and subaccount is that you will have fewer accounts to create and maintain in your General Ledger. This is very different than other ERP systems, such as Microsoft Dynamics GP. In this demo, we show what the account and subaccount combination looks like in a journal entry in Acumatica.
For more details view: Advantages of Acumatica versus Dynamics GP – General Ledger
Watch the video: Quick Look at Acumatica Chart of Accounts
Video Transcription:
“Now we’re going to jump over into the finance module. Here, this is where our general ledger resides. We’re going to start talking about the Chart of Accounts first here in Acumatica. The approach that Acumatica takes when it comes to Chart of Accounts is it has an account field for your main account number, or some people refer to it as your natural account number. Then, if you want to tag that transaction and that account with another dimension, Acumatica has what’s called Subaccounts. Now, I know systems like (Microsoft Dynamics) GP, and there are others, the way their account structures are set up is it takes that main or natural account. And it concatenates it together with your sub-accounts, with your other dimensions, that you would be able to then slice and dice your information on from a reporting perspective.
Now, the advantage of having that Chart of Account and that subaccount actually separated out is it does create a lot less accounts that you actually have to create and maintain in your general ledger. You’re not having to go out and to create all those different combinations of accounts that use the account and the subaccounts together like you do inside of a system like (Microsoft Dynamics) GP.
Here receiving your target account’s pretty standard, not going to take a lot of time to go over that. I think it explains itself by looking at the screen. I do want to navigate over to the subaccount screen just to give you a quick preview of that. Here’s our subaccounts we’re using in this demo company. It consists of a product line, which is that first segment. The characters leading up to the hyphen, and then the second segment is a department. You can mix and match values from each of those different sub-account segments together. If you don’t want to, if you don’t have a value for one, the system pre-fills that with zeros.
Acumatica can have an unlimited number of subaccounts. You’re not just restricted to the two that you’re seeing here, nor are you restricted to the character with the three that you’re seeing here, it’s totally configurable where you could have four or five subaccounts of any character length that you wish.
What does this look like when we’re transacting? We’re going to go over to a journal entry that’s already been created. We’re going to go to AP number 74, and we’re going to look at what the account and subaccount combination looks like in an entry that was created.
Down in the document details and that grid-like area, you’re going to see the second column next to branch. That’s what identifies our account number. Here we’re seeing this entry is getting posted to accounts payable, as well as our inventory purchase accrual account.
The column next to the description is our subaccount. Here’s where we see that subaccount in a separate field from our natural and it’s telling me that it’s linking it to the CON product line. The zero is an indication that it’s product-line-specific. We didn’t tag it with a department. That’s how the tagging of the subaccount looks within a transaction. If you were to key in this journal entry yourself, again, you’re going to specify your account, and then you’re going to tag it with a subaccount if it applies.
One other thing I’d like to point out in this journal entry that I think Acumatica standouts from other ERP systems are those three columns all the way to the right. Typically, what I see in most systems is you’ve got to look at reports that include your journal entry information to be able to see sub-ledger information. Here, right within this journal transaction, we’re seeing the customer, our vendors, depending on what type of transaction this is, we’re seeing their ID, we’re also seeing the inventory items that came into play on this transaction and we’re seeing the AP reference number, the document number.
Again, I just think that’s something that separates Acumatica out from others. Of course, you can always view back into your source document by hitting that View Source Document button above the grid and that will bring you to the actual AP bill, right from the transaction. But without even having to go there, you can tell who the vendor was and what was actually purchased right from looking at the journal entry in itself.
Now, I’m going to point out before we close this form is I’ve been saying the word Journal Entry. I think as accountants, that’s a typical term for transactions that are created here in the general ledger. What you’re seeing here on this screen, that you may have been wondering what it was, up towards the top below the module, you’re seeing Batch Number. You’re not seeing the word Journal Entry anywhere. At Acumatica, they just happen to call it a batch number. But that batch number field is what most of us accountants understand to be known as a journal entry number. Just want to point that out in case you were wondering what that batch number field was up there.”
This is a snippet from a detailed Acumatica overview. Watch the full video – Acumatica Lunch and Learn Part 2 – Acumatica Financials.
If you want to see more features that stand out in Acumatica review the series of articles our senior ERP consultants have published that compare Acumatica vs Microsoft Dynamics GP.
Get Acumatica user tips at www.calszone.com/tips.
Are you ready to evaluate Acumatica or looking for Acumatica training and support? Contact CAL Business Solutions at sales@calszone.com or 860-485-0910 x4.
By CAL Business Solutions, Acumatica and Microsoft Dynamics GP Partner, www.calszone.com
