What is accrual and how do I use double entry to enter it in my accounts
Accrual is an accounting method that allows the cost of a product or service to be included in the accounting period for which you are reporting, even if you have not received an invoice for that product or service. Not only does this help to reduce your profit and therefore your tax liability for the current accounting period, but your accounts should also be prepared to give a true and accurate reflection of the performance of the business for the time period they cover and accounting for accumulation it is important to ensure that this is the case.
I know many accountants who do not use them and it certainly saves the accountant time to calculate them but as I will demonstrate they are easy to calculate and record for double entry purposes and as such if your accounts are not posted and you think are necessary. I will certainly ask the accountant why they didn’t do this for you, please remember that you are signing the accounts as a true reflection of business transactions and inaccuracies can cause you problems if they are found to be incorrect regardless of the fact that the accounts are being used and for your tax return and you may commit an offense if the tax return is incorrect.
As mentioned earlier, an accrual is to account for expenses that have been incurred but you have not yet received an invoice, so for example if you are preparing your accounts then the accountancy fee will almost certainly be an accrual. The bills are for the period of the accounts and your accountant probably didn’t issue you an invoice because they didn’t do the work. To post an accrual, you would post a debit to the expense account, so for our example the debit would be to the accounting fees expense account, which would show as an expense in the profit and loss account, increasing the expense and reducing the business profit and a credit to the payables accrued account in the balance sheet, when you then receive the invoice and pay the bill then the transaction will be a credit to the payment method, let’s assume it is the business bank account and debit the payables accrued account , thus not showing again in the profit and loss statement, it will simply remove the liability from the balance sheet.
Using double entry bookkeeping skills as you can see is a very simple transaction and ensures that the timing of the expense is correct.
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