Ledger Data

The purpose of this book is to help finance professionals make the most of the digital environment they find themselves working in. This book is about working with accounting data in digital form, the environment it resides in, how it can be accessed, enhanced, and transformed into information. All without resorting to programming. It demonstrates how ledger data can be labelled and summarized to produce information. It helps produce...
More Description

The purpose of this book is to help finance professionals make the most of the digital environment they find themselves working in.

This book is about working with accounting data in digital form, the environment it resides in, how it can be accessed, enhanced, and transformed into information. All without resorting to programming.

It demonstrates how ledger data can be labelled and summarized to produce information.

It helps produce informative and timesaving solutions for routine tasks.

It describes using tools such as data access and spreadsheets. It provides tips, and stuff to watch for.

It also provides methods for validating a balance sheet, including reconciling accounts, maintaining inventory accuracy, and managing fixed assets.

It demonstrates how to verify reports and make financial forecasts.

And much more.

This book is a useful companion for anyone working with digital data.

Extracts....

a31....The most useful second reference after the Invoice reference for a supplier invoice is a Goods Received reference, as this will show acceptance, and facilitate enhancing the ledger data with data in the purchase order history table.

c1....Many of the Excel based methods and solutions featured in this book use the PivotTable tool.

c3....PivotTable enables the production of a three-dimensional Trial Balance when the records have been suitably labelled.

d1....Access and Excel complement each other and using both can enhance your work.

e1....For accounting tasks, it helps to be able to work with a copy of the ledger data offline, either with a data access tool, and/or a spreadsheet.

f4....For financial management, enhancing ledger data with external data is a big plus.

g6....Accounting for financed assets can be complex and time consuming, but it does not have to be.

h1....Inventory accuracy is an expression used to convey how the value of the inventory on the Balance Sheet compares with what it should be. There are various methods used to check this.

i23....This list provides an audit trail between the ledger records and the bank records.

i3....A financial forecast differs from a budget in that in a budget a figure is required for each ledger account. In a financial forecast, it suffices to work with figures in source groups.

Epilogue.... We have seen there are issues around access to data, and software developers not providing the data in a form that supports users working with desk-top tools. We have seen how these issues can be resolved with the data offline.