Generating Journal Entries

To generate journal entries, use the Generate Journals Request (JRNLGEN_REQUEST).

Selecting journals for Journal Generator processing is the final step required to process accounting entries. In this step, Journal Generator extracts accounting entries from the accounting entry tables to generate the actual journal entries for editing and posting.

Each time that you run Journal Generator, it creates journals for all or one application business unit or units as well as all or one ledger group or groups, and all or one Journal Generator template or templates set up for those business units, depending on the options that you define on the Journal Generator Request page.

This topic discusses how to:

Run Journal Generator processing.
Change journals created by Journal Generator.
Delete journals created by Journal Generator.

Page Used to Generate Journal Entries

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Generate Journals Request	JRNL_GEN_REQUEST	select General Ledger, then select Journals, then select Subsystem Journals, then select Generate Journals, then select Generate Journals Request	Initiate Journal Generator processing.

Generate Journals Request Page

Use the Generate Journals Request page (JRNL_GEN_REQUEST) to initiate Journal Generator processing.

Navigation

select General Ledger, then select Journals, then select Subsystem Journals, then select Generate Journals, then select Generate Journals Request

Image: Generate Journals Request page

This example illustrates the fields and controls on the Generate Journals Request page. You can find definitions for the fields and controls later on this page.

Journal Processing Options Group Box

Edit

Select this check box to run the Journal Edit process. No prerequisites are required.

Budget Check

Select this check box to run the Budget Check process. You must run the Journal Edit process before running this budget check.

Post

Select this check box to run the Post process. You must run edit and budget check before posting.

Note: If you select none of these check boxes, no additional processes are run.

Process Request Parameters

Request Number

To identify the process request, the system assigns this unique number to each run. You can create multiple requests. Use the scroll arrows to view requests already set up for the current user ID and run control ID.

SetID

This is required to extract the accounting entry definition for the request.

Accounting Definition Name

Identify which accounting entry definition the system should use when it creates the journal header and lines.

Application Business Unit

Journal Generator:

Extracts accounting entries for the request according to the option that you select.
Creates journal entries for one or all application business units.

The application business unit can be other than the general ledger business unit.

The prompt for this field depends on the system source of the accounting definition name. For example, if the system source of the accounting definition is JrnlGen-AP, Journal Generator uses the Payables business unit table. If the system source is JGen-Other, no prompt table is available.

Ledger Group

Journal Generator creates journal entries for the specified General Ledger ledger group.

Template

Journal Generator creates journal entries for the specified journal generator template. The setID of the prompt values is derived from the setID entered earlier on the page.

From Date Option

Select a value to further define which accounting entries Journal Generator extracts with this request. Journal Generator compares these dates to the accounting dates associated with each accounting entry. Select from the following values:

Specify Date: Uses the date specified to identify the period.

Current Date: Uses the date on which Journal Generator is run.

Begin Date - From Period: Uses the beginning date of the from period in the ledger.

Begin Date - To Period: Uses the beginning date of the to period in the ledger.

No From Date: Uses all open dates of the ledger before the chosen to date. This means that the system processes all dates up to the date in the To Date field.

Process Date: Date specified on the business unit journal process date option. It can be a specified date defined on the business unit, or it can be the current date.

From Date

Enter a to date if Specify Date is selected in the From Date Option field.

To Date Option

Specify Date: Uses the date specified to identify the period.

Current Date: Uses the date on which Journal Generator is run.

End Date - From Period: Uses the ending date of the from period in the ledger.

End Date - To Period: Uses the ending date of the to period in the ledger.

Process Date: Date specified on the business unit journal process date option. It can be a specified date defined on the business unit, or it can be the current date.

To Date

Enter a to date if Specify Date is selected in the To Date Option field.

Note: The application business unit and general ledger business unit that exist in the Accounting Entry table can differ. One business unit must be designated to derive the setIDs for the control records during the batch processing. The control records are ledger group and ledger definition tables, calendar tables, journal source table, and journal generator template table. The general ledger business unit is the business unit to derive the setIDs for these control records. In one particular request, whether all or one business unit is selected, Journal Generator might have multiple general ledger business units to process and cannot determine the associated setID at the point at which the request is defined. Therefore, the prompt setID that you see in the Ledger Group field and Journal Generator template may not necessarily be the same as the setIDs used by the batch programs.

Changing Journals Created by Journal Generator

When a journal comes from a subsystem, you can enable a specific user to change a journal that the Journal Generator process creates. On the Define User Preferences - General Ledger page, select this option, which allows a specific user to update the ChartField and amounts on the Journal Entry page for a journal that was created by the Journal Generator process. The ChartFields can be changed, even though the budget status is valid for the journal. Otherwise, all the fields are unavailable and the user can only edit and post the journal.

However, the business unit field is unavailable and cannot be changed on journal lines created from Journal Generator.

Warning! If you select Change Journal from Journal Generator and then change the ChartField values and re-edit the journal, you can create inconsistencies between the subsystem data and the general ledger data. Also, for journals that are generated for a subsystem that supported Commitment Control, the journal does not budget check again even though the ChartField values or the amount are changed.

For example, if the ChartField entered in the subsystem is Account 5011, Fund 100, Dept ID 200, and you change the ChartField to Account 5011, Fund 100, Dept ID 300, the accounting entry created in the subsystem is different from the one posted in the ledger. If the transaction is impacting the budget for department 200 initially, after the modification, it still impacts department 200 instead of 300 because it was budget checked in the feeder application, or subsystem.

The Journal Generator process always skips budget checking under the following circumstances:

When journals are generated by a subsystem that supports commitment control.
When you select the Skip Commitment Control in GL check box on the Accounting Entry Definition page.

The system does not budget check again an altered journal generated journal, whether or not you select Change Journal from Journal Generator on the Define User Preferences - General Ledger page.

For subsystems that do not support commitment control, including external source non-PeopleSoft applications, you can select Skip Commitment Control in GL on the accounting entry definition page. In this case, the journal-generated journals must be budget checked in General Ledger.

Deleting Journals Created by Journal Generator

The Journal Generator process gets rows from the Accounting Entry table when the value in the GL_DISTRIB_STATUS field is N. The process changes this value to D when it distributes the accounting entry to a general ledger journal. When a journal that was created from Journal Generator has an error, you can delete the journal on the journal entry page, and the system changes the value in the GL_DISTRIB_STATUS field in the Accounting Entry table to N. Then you can correct the error at the accounting entry level and rerun the Journal Generator process to create a new journal.