Specifications
Chapter 3. “Go Live” Tracks
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5. General Ledger
General Ledger is the final step to completing your accounting cycle and producing
financial statements. It is recommended that you wait until you are comfortable
to bring up you General Ledger so you can concentrate on refining the other parts
of the system. The very best time to go live with General Ledger, of course, is at
the beginning of a new accounting year. You would have your beginning year
balances for assets and liabilities, an accurate physical count and beginning
inventory value, and zero balance income and expense accounts. Of course you
could start anywhere in the middle of an accounting year, after a quarter or month
end, but you would need to decide if you want to enter the account balances up to
your go live date or start with zero balances.
In addition, you must consider the numbering of the chart of accounts. Your
system comes set up already with a comprehensive chart of accounts. The
numbering system uses 4-digit account numbers. Pre-set balance sheet and
income statement formats are already designed for you as well as all of the
integration accounts in the Variable File are correlated to the standard G/L. If
you have been running already, making GPOST entries here and there, you may
have realized the intricate and comprehensive role the General Ledger plays
throughout the system. We highly recommend you use the G/L chart of accounts
as it has been set up for you to avoid having to change many areas of the system.
If you decide, however, to change the numbering of the General Ledger, see “What
needs to be done before going live with a new G/L Chart of Accounts” below.
What needs to be done before going live with the standard G/L?
G 1. If not done already, determine how sales and cost of sales will be posted to
the General Ledger. Only one type of posting is allowed. This is set up in
the Variable File for Sales, G/L Integration, Sales, 1. G/L Posting Methods for
Sales
. G/L sales by type of sale (N) is the default because it is most
common.
N = by type of sale (charge vs. cash).
C = sales by customer class.
A = by assigned salesperson.
Y = sales by inventory group. Corresponding sales and cost of sales
accounts must be set up in the income section of the chart of
accounts for each group.
B = by customer class by inventory group.
G 2. Print a Trial Balance, Balance Sheet, and Income Statement. Determine if
changes need to be made to account numbers, account descriptions, and
report formats (such as layout, spacing, totaling, etc.). If major changes to
the basic chart of accounts are absolutely required, see the following
section, “What needs to be done before going live with a new G/L chart of
accounts.”
G 3. Make the minor changes in the G/L Master File (GM1.D) and the G/L
Format Master (GM2.D) if necessary.