Setting up the book for an existing business

If you are starting to use the Bookkeeping program for an existing business then you will most likely already have been using another program or a paper based book for your bookkeeping tasks. You will therefore need to set up the relevant information in Bookkeeping before entering new transactions so that Bookkeeping knows the current financial position of your business.

The information that most businesses will need to set up before starting to use the program for new transactions are:

• All ledger accounts and opening balances
• All customer and supplier details
• All sales tax codes (this includes GST, HST, VAT, etc) that are required for the jurisdictions that you operate your business in
• All open sales and purchases as at the start of the financial year (or conversion date depending on how you intend to change over; see below)

To do this you will at a minimum require a balance sheet and profit and loss statement at the start of the financial year that you are setting up the book for.

Using the balance sheet and profit and loss statement from the start of the financial year you will need to create the same accounts in Bookkeeping. You do this from the "Accounts" screen which is accessed from the “Accounts” menu item on the main menu or the "Accounts" button on the toolbar.

Screen: Accounts List

For each account listed on either the balance sheet or profit and loss statement (also called an income statement) you need to create an account in Bookkeeping.

There are some standard accounts already created in each book. Some are required and cannot be removed. But others like the "Bank Account" are optional and can be removed if you do not need them.

Once you have completed setting up each of the accounts you also need to set the opening balances based on the balance sheet.