Today's #TipTuesday is a "back to the basics" tip. I wanted to cover a few areas in GL Account Maintenance that are often overlooked or that users are unaware of.
The first one, Allow Account Entry, is a favourite of mine because too often I've seen organizations with reconciliation issues that were caused by "rogue" journal entries posted directly to accounts that shouldn't ever be posted directly to.
Allow Account Entry
I don't remember when this feature was added, but it's been years I'm sure. Allow Account Entry is marked by default which means transactions can be directly entered into this account. The intention is to give an organization control over GL accounts that are tied to sub-ledgers.
How to use it
Let's use Cash (Chequebook) control accounts as an example. Let's say that 000-1100-00 is tied to the OPERATING chequebook. I only want transactions to be posted to this GL account from transactions that use the OPERATING chequebook, right? I don't want a user to be able to post anything outside of that directly to this GL Account. I would uncheck Allow Account Entry and thus nothing could be posted to this GL account unless it is a "default" on any other transaction. Enter a cash receipt to OPERATING. It would debit this GL account by default and that would be allowed. If a user attempted to overwrite or type in this GL Account, it would fail because of the control.
So, to extend this further, in Payables or Receivables, the A/P or A/R Control Account(s) would need to be set up on vendors or customers, or as default Posting accounts. That would mean the accounts users want to be the control accounts will default on all of the transactions it should default on, but not be used in any other transaction manually. Even if it's the appropriate GL Account for a given transaction, posting would only be allowed if it defaults on the transaction, not if it's manually entered.
Level of Posting from Series
This one is a little more obscure and from what I've seen, most clients don't get into the nitty-gritty settings here. What this setting is for is choosing whether transactions from those 4 series would post to this account in Summary or Detail. This setting is only triggered if, in posting setup, the following setting is marked, which tells Dynamics GP to look here for the level of posting option.
How to use it
Let's say the organization has a ton of cash receipts, so much volume that they don't want all of that transaction history in the GL history as individual transactions. First, in Posting Setup below, go to Sales > Receivables Cash Receipts and under "Create a Journal Entry Per", choose Batch and then tick Use Account Settings.
Then, on the account(s) where they don't want details in the GL, they would change the "Sales" series level of detail to Summary. So, typically that would be in the Bank and Accounts Receivable accounts but it could extend to more based on where Cash Receipts typically post. Maybe they want the detail for the Cash side so they leave that at Detail but on the A/R side they want it in Summary so they only modify that accounts setting. There are options!
Include in Lookup
This 3rd feature is also somewhat obscure and again, I haven't seen many customers use it but it can be a nice way to clean up the Account lookups in the sub-ledgers to remove (hide) all of the irrelevant GL Accounts.
How to use it
The user interface on this one is a bit weird, I'll admit! By default all 4 series are selected which means in those series' sub-ledgers' Account Lookup windows, the accounts appear. Users are probably used to scrolling past the various irrelevant Balance Sheet accounts for instance, and maybe this can help them out by hiding accounts that really should never be posted to from a sub-ledger.
Clicking on one item in the list de-selects the rest. Holding down CTRL and an item deselects it (or allows multi-select, to hide this account from one series for instance and want the other 3 series' selected).
Here's what the lookup looks like, for the Cash Account in my original screenshot, when I deselected all series. This is what I see in Payables Trx Entry GL distribution lookups. I'm at the very top of the list of GL Accounts and the 000-1100-00 Cash GL account doesn't appear any longer. Imagine doing this with the majority of the Balance Sheet accounts that perhaps don't apply to Payables at all. The lookup would be a lot easier to manage!
