General Ledger Trial Balance Listing General Ledger Trial Balance Listing
Occasionally, adjusting transactions need to be made to the General Ledger. For example: depreciation transactions may need posting on a monthly or yearly basis. A trial balance may be printed for any fiscal period to let the accountant know all account balances as well as debit and credit transaction totals for the fiscal period.
This program allows printing of a summary trial balance or a working trial balance. After selecting the Trial Balance option from the General Ledger Report Menu, the following screen will appear:
Click on any column header to sort the listed items. This will be useful when the list of reports has grown.
Add or Change (button)
To modify the information used in generating the report, press the Add button or highlight the desired report title and press the Change button. For more information, see Add or Change a Trial Balance.
Press the Delete button and the following screen comes into view. Press the Yes button and the highlighted report will be deleted. If the No button is pressed, the program returns to the previous screen.
To print a report, press the Print button. For more information, see Printing Reports
Note: If the message "Nothing to Print" comes into view when the Print button is pressed, there are two main causes:
A. There is no information within the selected limits. Remove all limits then one at a time reinsert the limits. If the report still will not print, insert a new report title.
B. No report title is selected. The report title is used to store the selected limits. A report title must be selected in order for the report to print.
There are two reports available.
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This button closes the program and returns to the main screen.
Help (button)
see How to use help
To Add or Change a report, press the appropriate button and the following screen will come into view.
Report Title
The title of the report. Warning: The title is used to store the selected limits. If no title is entered for the report, the message "Nothing to Print" will come into view when trying to print the report.
Print for Fiscal Period
Enter the fiscal period number or use the arrows to select the fiscal period number.
To print all Fiscal Periods, leave the From and To boxes empty.
From
Selects the first fiscal period in a range of fiscal periods or a single fiscal period. Enter the fiscal period or press the lookup button and the Fiscal Period Maintenance screen comes into view. Highlight the desired period and press the Select button.
To
Selects the last fiscal period in a range of fiscal periods or a single fiscal period. Enter the fiscal period or press the lookup button and the Fiscal Period Maintenance screen comes into view. Highlight the desired period and press the Select button.
The Summary Trial Balance and Working Trial Balance are very similar in appearance. Samples of each listing are shown at the end of this section.
Summary Trial Balance (radio button)
The Summary Trial Balance is designed as an informational listing only.
Working trial Balance (radio button)
The Working Trial Balance is designed as a worksheet and includes columns for the accountant to use in calculating the adjusting transaction amounts.
Exclude 'Change' Column (check box)
Check this box if the Change column is to be excluded from the Trial Balance Report.
Order by Account number (radio button)
If this radio button is selected, the report will be listed by account number.
Order by Financial Statement (radio button)
If this radio button is selected, the report will be listed as the accounts appear on the Financial Statement. The user may select from the different Financial Statements by clicking on the down arrow. A list of Financial Statements will come into view.
Skip Accounts with No Activity (check box)
Check this box to exclude from the report any account that does not have activity within the specified Fiscal Period Range.
Skip Accounts with Zero Balance (check box)
Check this box to exclude from the report any account that has a zero balance at the end of the specified Fiscal Period Range.
Export to Text File (check box)
If this option is selected, a tab delimited document will be created in addition to the printed report. Enter the filepath and filename (e.g. C:\MY DATA\TRIAL BALANCE.TXT) or press the lookup button to locate the destination file. If a filename is entered for a file that does not exist, the file will automatically be created as the report is run.
Readability Bars (check box)
Select this option to add Readability Bars to the generated Report. Click the color box to select the Readability format. The following screen will come into view.
Select the Readability Bar color or press the Define button to select a Custom Readability Bar color.
All, Range, List (radio buttons)
Select the All radio button to ignore Account reporting limits. Select Range to enter a range of Accounts in the From and To fields. Select List to report on a list of selected Accounts.
These fields will be available if the Range radio button is selected.
From
Selects the first general ledger account in a range of accounts or a single account. Enter the general ledger account or press the lookup button and the General Ledger Account screen comes into view. Highlight the desired account and press the Select button.
To
Selects the last general ledger account in a range of accounts or a single account. Enter the general ledger account or press the lookup button and the General Ledger Account screen comes into view. Highlight the desired account and press the Select button.
Edit Account List (button)
Click the Edit Account List button to add or remove Accounts from the list of Accounts to be included in the report. The following screen will come into view.
Retrieve a Saved List / Save This List for Future Use (buttons)
Use these buttons to save the current list of included records for future use, or to retrieve a previously saved list. See Saved Report Limit Lists for more details.
Available Records
All Available Accounts that are not included in the list are displayed in these columns.
Included Records
All Included Accounts are listed in these columns. Use the arrows to move selected records or all records between the Available and Included areas.
Skip Inactive Accounts (check box)
Check this box and the listing will not print balances for any accounts that are currently marked Inactive.
Portrait (radio button)
Specifies how the report is positioned on the page when printed. Portrait is the standard. Portrait is printed vertically.
Landscape (radio button)
Specifies how the report is positioned on the page when printed. Landscape is printed horizontally.
Report Description - Summary Trial Balance Listing
The Summary Trial Balance is designed as an informational listing only.
Heading
The company name and date are listed.
Group
This is the group in which the General Ledger account is located.
Account #, Description
This is the number and description of the General Ledger Account.
Starting Balance
This figure represents the account balance for this account at the beginning of the selected fiscal period.
Debits and Credits
Each account will have a number in either the Debits or the Credits column. The figure represents the balance of all transactions posted to this account during the selected fiscal period.
Ending Balance
This figure represents the account balance for this account at the end of the selected fiscal period.
Report Totals
The totals at the end of the report indicate if the General Ledger is in balance for the selected fiscal period. The column totals for the Starting Balance and Ending Balance columns should both be 0.00. This indicates that the General Ledger was in balance at the beginning and the end of the fiscal period.
The column totals for the Debit and Credit columns should be identical. If these two figures are different from each other, investigate the difference using the Transaction File Listing program to find any out-of-balance postings in the selected fiscal period.
Change
This field is for the accountant’s use in specifying needed adjustments to account balances.
Click this button to save the current settings and print the report immediately, without having to return to the Report Title browse window.
Report Description - Working Trial Balance Listing
The Working Trial Balance Listing is designed as a worksheet and includes columns for the accountant to use in calculating the adjusting transaction amounts.
Group
This is the group in which the General Ledger account is located.
Account #, Description
This is the number and description of the General Ledger Account.
Starting Balance
This figure represents the account balance for this account at the beginning of the selected fiscal period.
Debits and Credits
Each account will have a number in either the Debit or the Credit column, but never in both. The figure represents the balance of all transactions posted to this account during the selected fiscal period.
Adjustments
This field is for the accountant’s use in specifying needed adjustments to account balances.
Profit/Loss
This field is for the accountant’s use in specifying needed adjustments to Profit/Loss balances.
Balance Sheet
This field is for the accountant’s use in specifying needed adjustments from the balance sheet.
Report Sample - Summary Trial Balance Listing
<Report Sample - Working Trial Balance Listing
