TRAVERSE Global v11.1

Building Chart of Accounts

Before processing data in General Ledger, set up the chart of accounts. A well-planned chart of accounts makes the General Ledger system easy to use, requires little maintenance, and can be expanded as a business grows. Take time to determine the best account structure for your present and future needs.

If you interface other TRAVERSE applications with General Ledger, see the appropriate user's guide for information about the accounts you need to post entries from.

Here are some suggestions for setting up your chart of accounts:

  • Use the main account numbers and account types to divide accounts into significant groups - assets, liabilities, equity, revenues, and expenses. These groups make it easy to select account categories when printing reports and statements; simply use the appropriate range of account numbers or account types.
  • If you use the same account numbering structure for several companies, you can save time by building one company's chart of accounts and then copy it to each of the other companies. You can also copy budget balances, last-year balances, forecast amounts, and the account mask from one company to another, one division to another, or one department to another within the same company.
  • Use the same ranges of Segment 1 numbers for the same account categories for all companies. It simplifies setting up the system, and you can use the same sets of statement layouts and contents for all companies when you print financial statements.
  • Use memo accounts to record miscellaneous figures that may be useful in preparing statements - for example, to store the number of shares of stock outstanding.
ClosedAccount Balances

The beginning Account Balance is the balance at the start of the current fiscal year or quarter. Each of the period balances is the net change in that balance caused by the transactions posted to that period.

The balances you enter should be current at the beginning of an accounting period. If you start in the middle of a fiscal year, use the period that corresponds to the period you start with. Do not start with period 1 unless the starting period is the first period in your fiscal year.

Set up actual balances in either of the following ways:

  • To produce a detailed audit trail of your entries, enter only the beginning actual balance when setting up an account. Later make GL Journal entries for the period balances and then post them to the GL Master.
  • If you want to save time and if you do not need a complete audit trail of your entries, enter the beginning balance and all the account balances.

After you enter or skip each period actual balance, you can enter the period budget balance, if applicable, for the current-year budget. After you enter or skip the period budget balance, you can enter the period last-year balance.

Use the Account Budgets function to enter budget and forecast balances using special formulas. To print comparative income statements or balance sheets, you must enter the last-year beginning and period balances.

ClosedPrint Consolidated Statements

Use the Consol To Account and Step fields in the Consolidate Chart of Accounts function to consolidate balances from one or multiple companies into another company. Consolidated financial statements can be printed without consolidating accounts.

ClosedTrial Balances

After entering all the account balances, print five Trial Balance Reports one for actual balances, one for current-year budget, one for last-year balances, one for next-year budget, and one for forecast amounts. Check the Trial Balances for errors and make sure that the amounts balance.