The following processes are known to occasionally put the equipment inventory account out of balance with the general ledger. To repair or prevent balancing issues with the equipment inventory/ general ledger accounts, follow the steps outlined in each Resolution.
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Manually entered journal entries to equipment inventory accounts will cause them to be out of balance with the general ledger
RESULT
By manually entering journal entries to your equipment inventory accounts, the general ledger will have a different balance (either higher or lower).
RESOLUTION
- Manually enter journal entries to equipment inventory accounts only under special circumstances (ie. new branch)
- Limit access to the journal entry system
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Using a "?" instead of an actual stock number on the general ledger could cause it to be out of balance with the equipment inventory account
RESULT
By using a "?" instead of an actual stock number on the general ledger, the general ledger will have a different balance than the equipment inventory account (either higher or lower)
RESOLUTION
- Limit access to the alternate charge option
- Check the following table switches:
- Make sure the ALLOW STK# ? ON W/O(Y,N,C)? switch in the CMBR table is set to C. This will prevent the system from closing work orders that have been created for "?" stock numbers.
- Make sure the Allow Stk# ? On A/P(Y,N) switch in the CMBR table is set to N
- Make sure the Stop RNT,WRTDWN,INV Posting If Sold switch in the DIVTAB table is set to Y. This will prevent the system from creating inventory entries once a unit is in an invoiced status. (If the switch is set to N, users can continue posting costing entries until the end of the month in which a unit is invoiced.)
- Make sure the Allow ? stock # switch in the WGINV table is deactivated. Also set the Perform Automatic Costing drop down switch to Mandatory if you use automatic costing
- Make sure the security switches for allowing a "?" on equipment invoicing, work orders and the rental module of IntelliDealer are deactivated
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Changing the invoice amount (original cost) of a unit through Equipment Profile
RESULT
If you change the invoice amount (or original cost) of a unit through the Equipment Profile, the general ledger will have a different balance than the equipment inventory account (either higher or lower).
RESOLUTION
Limit access to the Supplier Invoice Amount field:
- Use the field-level security controls to limit access to the Supplier Invoice Amount field.
- To limit access to all financial information, use the 'Protect Supplier/Financial Information' switch in system 800
Note: IntelliDealer will lock the Supplier Invoice Amount field by default and display a warning message if a user attempts to change the value in this field.
Note:
If you have a good LOGCGIB file, the following SQL file will display any stock numbers where the original cost has been changed (other than from 0 or .01, which happens on a daily basis):
select * from qs36f/logcgib as f1
where cbtype = 'A' and
cbuser||cbjob||cbdate||cbtime||'B'||cbco||cbord||cbdiv
in (select
cbuser||cbjob||cbdate||cbtime||'B'||cbco||cbord||cbdiv
from qs36f/logcgib as f2 where f1.cbocs <> f2.cbocs and
f2.cbocs > .01 and f1.cbocs > .01) -
You are using automatic costing in equipment invoicing but accidentally deselect it on an invoice.
RESULT
If automatic costing is enabled at your dealership but you accidentally deselect it on an invoice, the general ledger balance will stay the same but the equipment inventory account balance will decrease causing an out of balance error (the general ledger balance will be higher than the balance of the equipment inventory account).
RESOLUTION
Change the configuration for invoicing to make automatic costing mandatory.
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You put a stock number and an inventory account on a sales order (alternate charge), but the billing run is not completed. The same piece of equipment is then sold on a separate invoice and processed with an equipment billing run. When the sales order billing run finally goes through, the posting is done but the cost that came out of the inventory account on the sale was incorrect.
RESULT
In this situation the unit will be invoiced and removed from the inventory report but the amount taken out of the general ledger will not reflect the total cost of the unit. This results in the general ledger balance being higher than the balance of the equipment inventory account.
RESOLUTION
A warning will be displayed when attempting to release an equipment invoice if the unit is on an alternate charge. To completely prevent invoicing when a unit exists on an alternate charge, activate the Perform Additional Release Checks on Sale Stock # security switch in the green screen application.
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(For new dealers and add-ons) Opening balances were not balanced with the Equipment system.
RESULT
In this situation, the general ledger and equipment inventory account balances will be out of balance immediately, prior to any user interaction.
RESOLUTION
Fix conversion issues and get accounts back in balance. If necessary, move the over/under amount to a separate account and keep new inventory entries in balance while you continue to look for the problem.
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Manually changing the G/L account in equipment profile without a corresponding G/L entry (for example, during a branch transfer, or when adding a unit to a rental fleet, etc.)
RESULT
If you manually change the G/L account in the equipment profile without creating a corresponding G/L entry, the general ledger will be in balance but two inventory accounts will be out of balance (either higher or lower).
RESOLUTION
Tighten up your security or configure the equipment defaults to create journal entries automatically for branch transfers.
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A work order is closed to an inventory account but the work order billing run is not yet processed. The unit on the work order is then sold and processed on an equipment billing run.
When the work order billing run is processed, it hits the general ledger but the unit is sold which increases the dollar amount on the general ledger (even though the unit does not appear on the general ledger as it has been invoiced.)RESULT
In this situation the unit will be invoiced and removed from the inventory report but the amount taken out of the general ledger will not reflect the total cost of the unit. This results in the general ledger balance being higher than the balance of the equipment inventory account
RESOLUTION
A warning will be displayed when attempting to release an equipment invoice if the unit is on a closed internal work order. To completely prevent invoicing when a unit exists on a closed internal work order, activate the Perform Additional Release Checks on Sale Stock # security switch in the green screen application.
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An accounts payable voucher is created and an entry is made on the equipment inventory account, but the batch is not updated right away. The unit on the voucher is then sold and processed on an equipment billing run. When the batch is updated the general ledger is updated as well, but the sold unit is not.
RESULT
In this situation, the balance on the general ledger balance will be higher than the balance in the equipment inventory account.
RESOLUTION
Set the Stop Writedown switch in the DIVTAB table of the green screen application to Y to prevent vouchers from being posted if they contain units that have already been sold.
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You post an entry to the equipment inventory account when selling a unit to update the cost, which it does, however the automatic costing entry does not reflect the new cost when it does the costing entry.
RESULT
In this situation, the amount that was posted to equipment inventory account is not relieved out of the general ledger when the invoice is processed by the billing run. This results in the balance of the equipment inventory account being higher than the balance of the general ledger.
RESOLUTION
Custom accounting entries are processed first, then the costing entries are processed for units sold on invoice segments.
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If you key different vouchers to original cost within the same batch you do not get an error & the A/P update will update G/L for both & the first one hits the unit
RESULT
In this situation, the general ledger balance will be higher than the balance in the equipment inventory account.
RESOLUTION
Original cost vouchers cannot be copied and users will get error 1794 if they try to enter the original cost of a unit on two pending vouchers.
Equipment Balancing Reports
There is an equipment balancing report available that provides a very basic snapshot of the total inventory value for the selected unit statuses compared with the general ledger. In order to view the report you must first run the G/L update (#CRTDEPTMC) from the green screen application.
There is also a Crystal Report that mimics the IntelliDealer report (it needs only minor customization to point it to the right library). To view this report, go to the IntelliDealer Crystal Reports download site.