1. Administrator Guide
  2. Administration – Global Settings
  3. Organization
  4. Accounting Periods

Accounting Periods

Accounting periods form.

The accounting period functionality lets you associate separate accounting dates with most transactions as well as with reports drawing from these accounting dates. The ability to maintain separate accounting dates can be particularly helpful when the original transaction date of an entity must be independent from the date, as signified by a financial report or general ledger application.

Review the following examples:

The accounting period functionality lets you associate an additional independent accounting date with a transaction. You can then configure reports to leverage the accounting dates, rather than the original transaction dates. The accounting date functionality is enabled with the accounting period functionality.

To enable this functionality, Creating a Support Case and request that the following switch be enabled: Enable the accounting period feature to manage transaction dating (Support - Check with Sales before enabling). After you have activated the accounting period functionality, the following transactions have an acct_date field available:

To create an Accounting period:

  1. Go to Administration > Global Setting > Organization > Accounting periods.

  2. Select New Accounting period from the Create Button.

  3. Name the accounting period (Ex: P1 November 2012).

  4. Select the start and end date for this period (Ex: 11/01/12 and 11/15/12).

  5. Select the Transaction date for this period. This is the date that displays in the accounting date field when a transaction is created and associated manually or automatically with this Accounting Period.

  6. Add any relevant notes to the Notes field that may be helpful. (For example, you might type, “This is the first of two accounting periods in November 2012.”)

  7. Check the Active box, unless the accounting period does not need to be active at the moment. (Inactive accounting periods do not show up in drop-down lists for association with transactions).

  8. Check the Current accounting period box to which the accounting period should be referenced if and when the current accounting period is selected in any billing or revenue recognition rules setups.

  9. Click Save.

To auto-populate Accounting Dates charges through Project Billing rules:

  1. Go to Projects and select a project. Go to Billing > Billing rules.

  2. Drill into the billing rules. Under the Accounting date setup, How to get the accounting date field. Select either:

    • Use the accounting date specified below
      If this is selected, the Accounting date field must be populated with a specific transaction date.
      OR
    • Use the accounting period specified below
      If this is selected, the Accounting period drop-down listed below must be populated with a specific accounting period, or more commonly, the dynamic current accounting period selection. If you select the current accounting period, the accounting period that has the Current accounting period box checked is used.
  3. Click Save.
    The next time the billing rule is run, charges generated have the Accounting date populated according to the Accounting Period setup within the rule.

To update the Accounting Dates on charges:

  1. Go to Projects and select a project. Go to Billing > Billing rules.

  2. To update the accounting date one charge at a time, drill into a charge and manually update the accounting date field.

  3. To update the accounting date on charges in bulk, go to the open charges tab within the Invoices application. Select the check boxes next to the charges that need to be updated, click the run-an-action icon, select Change the Accounting Date to and select the appropriate accounting period.

  4. Click OK.

    Note:

    Access to the accounting dates is controlled by an employee's application role and can be hidden on forms using form permissions. See Form Permissions.

To auto-populate Accounting Dates on Revenue Recognition Transactions through Revenue Recognition rules:

  1. Go to Projects and select a project. Go to Recognition > Recognition rules.

  2. Drill into the revenue recognition rules. Under the Accounting date setup, designate How to get the accounting date field. Select either:

    • Use the accounting date specified below
      If this is selected, the Accounting date field must be populated immediately below with a specific transaction date.
      OR
    • Use the accounting period specified below
      If this is selected, the Accounting period drop-down immediately below must be populated with a specific accounting period, or more commonly, the dynamic Current accounting period selection. If the current accounting period selection is picked, the accounting period that has the Current accounting period box checked is used.
  3. Click Save.
    The next time revenue recognition is run, these updated rules create revenue recognition transactions that have the Accounting date populated according to the Accounting Period setup within the rule.

To update the Accounting Dates on revenue recognition transactions:

  1. Go to Projects and select a project. Go to Recognition > Recognition rules.

  2. To update the accounting date on one revenue recognition transaction, drill into a revenue recognition transaction and manually update the accounting date field.

  3. To update the accounting date on revenue recognition dates in bulk across a project, drill into a project and go to the revenue recognition transactions tab. Select the check boxes next to the charges that need to be updated, click the run-an-action icon, select Change the Accounting Date to and select the appropriate accounting period. Click OK.

Updating Accounting Dates Automatically

You can update an accounting date manually, or arrange to have the accounting date automatically populated at a particular time. See Accounting Dates.

This applies to the following: