Hi Anita, sorry if I missed your point.
It is quite a few years since I started a new year with an empty file, but IIRC, the only way to carry account balances forward is to manually create the transactions to Equity:Opening Balances in the new, blank file. So all your asset & liability accounts (well, the ones carrying forward any balance)would have an transaction to Equity:Opening Balances at the start of the year - but you have to create them yourself. Normally, the income and expense accounts wouldn't carry a balance. suggest an account summary report from the close of the last year's books would help here! Thinking about it, instead of Equity:OpeningBalances you could use an account called something like Equity:BalancesForward if it makes it clearer! HTH, Maf. On Thursday, 25 May 2017 12:35:26 BST Anita Graves wrote: > Yes, Maf. If you read my latest message, I think I got that. But, as I > explained, I didn’t know how to carry forward balances in the asset > accounts when I opened the new file. I just exported the account tree and > that was all…. > > Anita > > > On 25 May 2017, at 2:32 PM, Maf. King <m...@chilwell.net> wrote: > > > > Hi Anita. > > > > why would you expect a change in the opening balance account? > > > > At the start of the year, you have some money (say €100), which shows up > > in an asset account as you say, transferred from Equity:OpeningBalances. > > > > You spend most of the money - so asset drops to €14, and expenses:whatever > > is up to €86 > > > > Your donor is happy to "unrestrict" the little bit of leftover, so asset > > goes to zero and Bank or Cash goes up by €14 > > > > Your opening balance was, is, and will always be €100. It is a fixed point > > in time - on April 1st (or whenever the year started) - not a running > > balance. > > > > HTH, > > Maf. > > > > On Thursday, 25 May 2017 12:11:07 BST Anita Graves wrote: > >> Now, the money has been spent, except for about Euro 14 which I have > >> returned to the cash account. The asset account for the balance forward > >> was decreased to zero, and the expense accounts reflect the accurate > >> transactions. > >> > >> Problem: There was no corresponding reduction in the Equity:Opening > >> Balances account. Why? Why not? How can I fix that?? I don’t know how > >> to carry forward balances from one file to the next (i.e., from one year > >> to > >> the next. I opened a new file for a new year by exporting the account > >> tree > >> and started with 0 balances in every account. -- Maf. King PGP Key fingerprint = 8D68 A91F 733B 2C1F 43B7 2B7C E591 E8E1 0DE7 C542 _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list gnucash-user@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.