1 Overview to General Accounting I

This chapter contains these topics:

The JD Edwards World General Accounting system helps you manage the general ledger and reporting functions for your organization.

With the General Accounting system, you can streamline the day-to-day functions of your entire accounting department. The system provides an accurate and cost-effective way of organizing, maintaining, recording, and analyzing financial information. This information, whether gathered from one site or from multiple sites around the world, provides streamlined transaction processing for timely analysis and ease of reporting.

For organizations that have offices around the world, JD Edwards World provides the flexibility needed to operate in multiple countries, each with unique currency, language, and statutory reporting requirements.

1.1 System Integration

The General Accounting system works with other JD Edwards World systems to ensure that all information is fully integrated into the general ledger. In turn, the general ledger provides flexible and accurate financial reporting.

The systems integrate with the General Accounting system, as follows:

1.1.1 Manufacturing and Distribution

Module Description
Sales Order Management General ledger transactions - detail or summary - are created during the sales order update. These transactions are revenues that are associated with the accounts receivable invoice.
Procurement General ledger transactions are created during the purchase order receipt and voucher match processes. These transactions represent the purchase receipts and vouchers, respectively. Additionally, receipt and voucher information is created at one time by the Receiver and Voucher program.
Manufacturing Accounting General ledger transactions are created within the manufacturing accounting process. These transactions represent material issues, completions, labor hours, and variances.

1.1.2 General Business

Module Description
Payroll General ledger transactions - detail or summary - are created during the payroll cycle. These transactions represent labor and labor billing distribution, burden, disbursements, and equipment distribution. Journals for labor distribution, flat burden, equipment distribution, and labor billing distribution can be created outside the payroll cycle, if desired.
Fixed Assets and Equipment Management The same detail transaction records are used by the Fixed Assets, Equipment Management, and General Accounting systems. A post program for fixed assets updates the information in the fixed assets balances file.

1.1.3 Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC)

Module Description
Job Cost Job cost integrates directly with the general ledger by means of the same, shared account structure.
Contract Management Progress payments that are posted, in turn, update the general ledger.
Change Management Transactions are created for each account on the job and are updated to the general ledger by means of ledger types.

1.2 General Accounting Features

Typically, you generate transactions, such as invoices, vouchers, receipts, and payments, using other JD Edwards World systems. However, you can also enter transactions directly using the General Accounting system.

The features of the General Accounting system include:

  • Multiple ledger flexibility

  • Multi-national functionality

  • Reporting

  • Account balance consolidations

  • Budgeting

  • Allocations

  • Reorganization flexibility

1.2.1 Multiple Ledger Flexibility

Multiple ledgers provide flexibility without requiring you to enter unnecessary and redundant data. They allow you to:

  • Define any number of unit or monetary ledger types, such as actual, budgeted, or non-domestic currency.

  • Retrieve data about anything - from global revenue by product to an individual employee's expenses - without creating separate account numbers.

  • Maintain transactions in the appropriate ledger and post to the general ledger by summary or detailed transaction.

  • View two ledgers simultaneously. For example, you can view the domestic and reporting currency ledgers, or the budget to actual ledgers, with the variance calculated online.

1.2.2 Multi-National Functionality

JD Edwards World includes Multi-national functionality, enabling you to consolidate, restate, compare, stabilize, and process unlimited currencies in many ways. Multi-national features that work with the General Accounting system include, but are not limited to:

Multi-National feature Description
Consolidation and currency restatement With consolidation and currency restatement, you can:

  • Automatically calculate translation adjustments when restating your foreign subsidiaries into your parent company's currency

  • Choose the average period, period end, period beginning, historical, or budgeted exchange rates, which gives you maximum flexibility for your currency restatement

  • Simplify compliance with directives such as SFAS 52 and IAS 20 by maintaining entries based on both local accounting practices and the parent company's accepted accounting practices

  • Report financial results in two currencies by using the Detailed Currency Restatement program to create records in the alternate (XA) ledger even if it has the same currency as the domestic (AA) ledger. This provides you flexibility reporting from the restated ledger for all companies set up for detailed restatement.
Highly inflationary economies You can maintain dual sets of books in highly inflationary economies - one in the local currency and one in a stable currency. You can also create foreign currency transactions.
Flexible reporting capabilities Reports and inquiries show information that helps you analyze your balances for many different currencies. For example, you can analyze currency exposure and detailed bank account activity by the originating currency.
Statutory chart of accounts You can maintain a chart of accounts according to the requirements of both a parent company and its subsidiaries. Various reports are provided to satisfy statutory reporting requirements.
Account balances by currency You can control which account balances you want to store by currency. You specify the accounts by either company or ranges of account numbers.
"As if" reposting "As if" reposting eliminates rate fluctuations for budgetary analysis by restating foreign transactions as if they had all been entered using the exchange rate from the same date.
Currency processing You can use any currency in the world, from the Australian dollar to the Euro. All transaction entries can be generated in a domestic currency, or in a foreign currency with automatic conversion, when necessary. You can designate a different currency preference for each of your companies, suppliers, customers, accounts, and employees.
Chart of accounts in multiple languages You can maintain multiple language descriptions for your business units and chart of accounts.
Bank Statement Processing Some countries have banking practices that rely heavily on magnetic media processing, electronic fund transfers, and direct bank involvement in the settlement of outstanding debts. For these countries, the bank statement serves as the source document for all banking activity. To enter and reconcile the transactions that appear on your bank statement, you use bank statement processing.

1.2.3 Reporting

The General Accounting system provides standard reports. These reports supplement the online management summary information for detailed analysis. You can customize the presentation of information, as needed.

1.2.4 Account Balance Consolidations

At any time in the accounting period - not just period end - you have access to account balances and consolidated information. Whether you review your financial information online or use printed reports, you can see this information at the level of detail most meaningful to you.

While reviewing account balances online, you can easily access the detail of the originating transactions. This provides for timely resolution when questions about a transaction arise.

You can review your consolidated financial reports online, anytime, and across multiple currencies and languages.

1.2.5 Multi-Site Consolidations

Your organization might have JD Edwards World systems running in multiple locations. You can group, or consolidate, account balances at these locations and send the information to a centralized location for statutory and management reporting.

The consolidated information that you create will be accessible to all standard JD Edwards World programs.

1.2.6 Budgeting

Whether your organization makes long-range plans that require high-level budget projections or short-term forecasts that need detail-level budgets, the tools you use for budgeting need to be flexible to meet your needs.

You determine the amount of detail in your budgets. For example, you can create budgets at the product level, business unit level, major account category, or specific account. You can also create journal entries for each account and budget amount. This detailed method provides for a formal audit trail and is used by construction companies and government agencies that need to record supplemental appropriations for an original budget.

To create budgets using a simple method, you can work with allocations or seasonal pattern spreads. Or, have managers create their department budgets using a PC spreadsheet and upload the figures into the final budget.

You can compare your budget-to-actual figures online using year-to-date, period-to-date, or any other time frame. This allows you to respond to variances in a timely manner. If your budget changes, you can create journal entries that explain the reason for the change to ensure that next year's budgets are more accurate.

Multi-national organizations can convert budgets into their functional currency for review at a department, subsidiary, country, continent, or global level.

1.2.7 Allocations

With allocations, you can assign and manage your costs more efficiently and accurately. You can define allocations for many purposes, such as to distribute expenses and create annual or period budgets. With one simple allocation, you can create budgets that reflect an increase or decrease over last year's budget or actual amounts.

You can allocate from one account to another account, based on values in a third account. For example, you can allocate your monthly utilities expense from an overhead account to individual departments based on their percentage of square footage. In more complicated environments, you can create allocations based on other allocations and process them together.

This guide describes only indexed allocations.

See Also:

1.2.8 Reorganization Flexibility

Whether you are reorganizing to meet changing market demands, adding locations to take advantage of favorable business environments, or beginning a new project, you might need to change your organizational structure.

Traditionally, when organizations have changed their reporting structure, it has entailed reworking the chart of accounts, followed by a time-consuming data conversion to get the historical data into the new account coding design. With the General Accounting system, you can change your reporting structure in an efficient, timely manner. As you change an account number, the associated transaction detail and balance histories are transferred easily by the system, eliminating the need for difficult data conversions.

A free-form account number (that can be used as a cross-reference to an "old" account number) is available for the initial conversion to JD Edwards World software. The free-form account number can also be used for other purposes, such as resequencing a balance sheet. You can design a balance sheet that complies with your auditor's needs without affecting the balance sheet that is meaningful to you.

1.3 Account Numbering Concepts

This guide uses the Business Unit.Object.Subsidiary standard notation for account numbers.

Figure 1-1 Business Unit.Object.Subsidiary Standard Notation for Account Numbers

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Description of "Figure 1-1 Business Unit.Object.Subsidiary Standard Notation for Account Numbers"

The account number includes both the Where and What. You can use periods, commas, or other user defined symbols to separate the components of the account number. The period (.) separator is the default.

See Also:

1.3.1 Business Unit - The "Where"

The business unit describes where in your organization the transaction will have an impact. It represents the lowest organizational level within your business - where you record all revenues, expenses, assets, liabilities, and equities. For example, a business unit can be a department, branch office, or truck.

Business units are unique 12-character, alphanumeric fields. The following applies:

  • A business unit can belong to only one company.

  • A company can have several business units.

  • Each company has at least one business unit for the balance sheet.

1.3.2 Object.Subsidiary - The "What"

The Object.Subsidiary represents what type of transaction is being created. An object is a description of the transaction, for example, Cash in Bank. A subsidiary is an expanded description of the object account, for example, Cash in Bank.FNB (First National Bank).

There are two parts of the "what":

  • Object (four or six characters, depending on your organization's setup)

    You can set up a five-character object if you are implementing the flexible chart of accounts feature.

  • Subsidiary (one to eight characters)

1.4 General Accounting System Flow

Figure 1-2 General Accounting System Flow

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Description of "Figure 1-2 General Accounting System Flow"

1.5 Tables Used by General Accounting

1.5.1 Tables and Information Flow

Figure 1-3 Tables and Information Flow

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Description of "Figure 1-3 Tables and Information Flow"

1.5.2 Tables and Descriptions

The General Accounting system uses the following primary tables:

Table Description
Account Master (F0901) Stores account definitions, including account numbers and descriptions. There is one record per account.
Account Balances (F0902) Stores account balances, for example, net postings for each period and prior year balances (net and cumulative). There is one record per account/ledger type/subledger/fiscal year/transaction currency (if you post by currency). Also stores Enhanced Subledger Analysis information which allows for more detailed accounting for invoices and vouchers.
Account Ledger (F0911) Stores transaction detail in the general ledger. There is one record per transaction line item that is not currency related. When you use multiple currencies, there are two records per transaction line item, one domestic and one foreign. Also stores Enhanced Subledger Analysis information which allows for more detailed accounting for invoices and vouchers.
Next Numbers (F0002) Stores the next available number for all automatically assigned numbers in the system, such as batch numbers and transaction numbers.
User Defined Codes (F0005) Stores user defined codes and their descriptions.
Business Unit Master (F0006) Stores business unit definitions, including name and number, company, and category codes.
Fiscal Date Patterns (F0008) Stores the different fiscal date patterns that are set up for use by any company on the system.
General Constants (F0009) Stores the rules that control General Accounting system-wide issues, such as account coding, batch control, batch approval, date validation, intercompany settlements, currency conversion, and batch balancing.
Company Constants (F0010) Stores company definitions, including number and name, fiscal date pattern, and current period.
Batch Control Records (F0011) Stores identification header records for each batch.
Automatic Accounting Instructions (F0012) Stores the rules that control how the system creates automatic balancing entries, special interim totals for reports, and general information about the chart of accounts.
52-Period Fiscal Patterns (F0008B) Stores the ending dates of fiscal periods for 52-period accounting.
52-Period Accounting Account Balances (F0902B) Stores the 52-period version of the Account Balances table.
Sales/Use/VAT Tax (F0018) Stores the transaction detail for each item that is subject to tax.
Ledger Type Master (F0025) Stores rules for specific ledger types, such as:

  • Attached ledger types for units

  • Financial rules such as balancing required

  • Column titles for ledger comparisons
Business Unit Data Types (F00690) Stores descriptions of supplemental data types for each business unit.