doncram, I think that you contradicted yourself when you said GnuCash supports inventory control then described how difficult it is to emulate a few of the most basic features of inventory control.
On Fri, Oct 2, 2020 at 4:21 PM doncram <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Frederick & others -- It has often been said in this email forum that > GnuCash doesn't support inventory, but I think that's basically wrong. > What I mean is that while GnuCash has no separate inventory module as are > available in some versions of Quickbooks, say, one can use GnuCash + a > supporting spreadsheet (in Excel or freeware LibreOffice Calc which both > have some database features) perfectly well for accounting for a business > with inventory. A few demonstrations/examples are needed to provide for > arriving potential users though. > > A simple approach which might work especially if there are not too many > transactions could work as follows: > > *When purchasing inventory, perhaps of a few different types*: > a) enter transaction into GnuCash as increasing one big Inventory account > and decreasing cash without any detail about numbers of units of what > types, just reference the invoice or sales receipt which you file into a > Vendor file. > b) in the spreadsheet create rows as needed for each the different types of > inventory (say Barnevelder chickens and Chantecler chickens) and in three > new columns for the purchases record the numbers and prices paid and total > dollars paid for each > Repeat as new transactions happen, adding 3 columns each time. > Keep one column carrying the sum of all purchases as an estimate of current > value of each type, with a sum at bottom reporting the total value of > inventory. > > *At the end of a month or other accounting period*, do an inventory > inspection and record in a new set of 3 columns the number of each type > which you count, a price per unit (perhaps use the original or the last > purchase price, or a new estimate of your own based on what you see and > know), and a calculated current total dollars value. Perhaps some units > will have been lost or some new chicks have been hatched and some prices > will have changed, so the sum of value of current inventory will be lower > or higher. Then update your financial value in Quickbooks to reflect the > amount of that change: increase or decrease "Inventory" value and > recognize a gain (say "Gain from Inventory growth") as income or a loss > (say "Loss from Inventory decline") as expense. > > Also *whenever you sell any units*, add three columns for the numbers sold, > the price per unit, the dollars yielded. In GnuCash enter an increase in > cash and recognize "Revenue from sale of chickens" or whatever. > > In your business, you will also record expenses for operating costs, and > any revenues from sales of eggs say, and in the Income Statement for a > given period you will see whether you have made a profit or loss on the > period. In this approach, with your counting and revaluing your inventory > to roughly a current market value each period, profit can be shown due to > gains in value even if there have not been any sales. As suggested here, > the spreadsheet would tend to expand to the right. But perhaps that is > fine, as after all there is no shortage of empty columns available in any > spreadsheet nowadays. > > Note there are many possible different implementations. One could have > GnuCash inventories for each type of chicken, so values for each type would > appear in your Balance Sheet, though at cost of requiring many more GnuCash > transaction entries. One could use "inventory valuation" approaches other > than the current market value estimation approach suggested above, > variations that may be legally allowed in financial accounting (e.g. First > In First Out (FIFO), LIFO, Average Cost, Specific Identification), but are > probably not worth bothering with. These variations might allow for some > gaming to advance or defer taxes due, or to manipulate reported earnings of > your firm sooner or later, but such gaming is generally not worthwhile. > Also a more database-oriented approach to organizing the information might > be possible, say with columns for each type of chicken and one row for each > transaction or re-valuation or new total value. Perhaps that would allow > for some different types of reports using DCOUNT and DSUM type formulas. > > But perhaps the above approach would work for you? Maybe you could > explain a bit more about what you want to do? > > In my opinion, Quickbooks' inventory feature is cumbersome, requiring one > to go through multiple screens to create a new inventory type, and > requiring application of just one type of valuation (I think requiring > every unit to be valued at same price per unit always, i.e. this is suited > only to situations where suppliers are unrealistically required to sell to > you at the same price forever). It does not allow one to choose other > valuation approaches. It probably fails to provide reports that you want > suited to your application. It fails to support useful calculations that > are often wanted (such as for when inventory of each type should next be > purchased and what order quantity should be used, based on "Economic Order > Quantity" theory or similar). I know of manufacturing firms which use > Quickbooks for accounting but absolutely would never use it for inventory; > they instead use a separate spreadsheet for inventory that works for them. > > Note in past discussions, as mentioned, sometimes users have been directed > to try to adapt GnuCash's feature for tracking shares of investment trading > securities (which looks up current stock prices online, and handles stock > splits, and so on), but stocks are fundamentally different and it never > works for a user to take that approach. By the way I am in favor of > several other features being added to GnuCash to make it more widely > usable, but not for an inventory module. > > Frederick, does this help? > > Don Cram > > > On Fri, Oct 2, 2020 at 5:36 AM Derek Atkins <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Gnucash does not have inventory support. > > > > If you only need to track a few items you can probably hack something > > together using a Stock account, but it is not a true inventory. > > > > -derek > > Sent using my mobile device. Please excuse any typos. > > On October 2, 2020 5:17:09 AM Duikerbos <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > Morning > > > > > > I am starting a small Broiler project and using GnuCash to track > > > transactions > > > > > > Is it possible to track stock levels, birds purchased less birds sold? > > > > > > > > > Frederick > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > gnucash-user mailing list > > > [email protected] > > > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > > > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > > > If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > > > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > > > ----- > > > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > > > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > > > > _______________________________________________ > > gnucash-user mailing list > > [email protected] > > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > > If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > > ----- > > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > > > _______________________________________________ > gnucash-user mailing list > [email protected] > To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: > https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user > If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see > https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. > ----- > Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. > You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All. > -- David Carlson _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list [email protected] To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
