Set up your Chart of Accounts

Setup

What this is

Your Chart of Accounts is the list of accounts every transaction posts to. Your sales, your expenses, your bank accounts, your receivables, and so on, arranged as a tree. You set this up before you start posting transactions. The good news is that Cloudby can build most of it for you.

Before you start

You need access to Finance settings. If you do not see Settings under Finance, ask whoever manages your Cloudby account to give you access, or to set this up for you.

Open the Chart of Accounts

Go to Menu > Finance > Settings > Chart of Accounts. You see your accounts as a tree, grouped by type such as Income, Cost of Sales, Expenses, Assets, Cash and Bank, Receivables, Liabilities, Payables and Equity.

Build your chart with the Setup Wizard

You do not have to create accounts one by one. Open the Setup Wizard and Cloudby assembles a ready-made chart from template sets you choose. Work through it in three moves:

1. Pick a category, then a template. Start with a base template that suits your country and type of business. This gives you a solid starting chart.
2. Add optional add-on sets on top, such as multi-currency, which bring in the extra accounts they need. Order matters: choose the base template before any add-ons.
3. Tick the accounts you want to include. Use Select all or Select none to move quickly.

The sets add together, so mix and match the ones that fit you. The wizard gives you a working chart in minutes, which you can fine-tune. You can always add or change accounts later.

Add or edit an account

1. Select the parent account the new one belongs under.
2. Click Create and fill in the form (see the field guide below).
3. Click Create to save it. To change an account later, select it, click Edit, make your changes, then Update. To remove one, use Delete.

Field guide

• Parent. Where the account sits in the tree.
• Code. The account number. Leave it blank to let Cloudby assign the next one. It must be unique.
• Name. What the account is called.
• Description. Optional notes.
• Placeholder. Set this to Yes to make a heading-only folder that you cannot post to.
• Type. The kind of account. You pick the specific subtype, and Cloudby works out the top-level type from where the account sits in the tree.
• Currency. Defaults to your organisation currency. It locks once the account has transactions.
• Active. Turn an account off without deleting it.
• Taxable. Appears only for income and expense accounts.

Account types

When you create an account you choose its type. Cloudby works out the top-level group from where the account sits in the tree. The full set of types:

• Income: Sales, Sales Return, Discount Allowed, Sales Adjustment, Other Income, Fixed Asset Disposals.
• Cost of Sales: Services Outsource, Inventory Purchases, Production Labour, Production Overhead, Production WIP Materials Adjustment, Production Raw Materials Adjustment.
• Expense: Salary, Bank Fees, Income Tax, Fixed Asset Depreciation, Rounding, Inventory Adjustments, Realised FX Gain or Loss.
• Equity: Capital, Retained Earnings.
• Asset (current): Cash, Bank, Fixed or Term Deposits, Receivable, Receivable (Non-Trading), Inventory, Inventory Incoming, Production Finished Goods, Production Work-In-Progress, Production Raw Materials, Production Supplies, Vendor Deposit, Input Tax (GST/VAT), Suspense, Cash-In-Transit.
• Asset (non-current): Investment, Fixed Asset, Accumulated Depreciation, Intangible Asset.
• Liability (current): Payable, Payable (Non-Trading), Credit, Customer Deposit, Overdraft, Output Tax (GST/VAT), Accruals, Accruals for Payroll, Accruals for Reimbursement, Provisions, Provision for Income Tax.
• Liability (non-current): Bank Long-term Loans Payable, Director Loans Payable, Staff Loans Payable.

Cash, Bank, Receivable and Payable accounts are handled specially by Cloudby and allow only basic edits.

Related

• How documents work
• Add cash and bank accounts
• Configure taxes