Expense payments

An expense payment pays expenses you owed a supplier: expenses recorded to Accounts Payable or to another liability account (their Paid Through). It works like a payment made for purchase bills.

Go to Expenses › Expense Payments Made and click Add. For a single expense you can also click Record Payment on the expense page.

Recording an expense payment

1. Choose the Supplier. Their unpaid approved expenses are listed with Bill Amount and Amount Due.
2. Fill in Payment Date, Payment Type, Paid Through (the cash or bank account), Currency, Reference Number and Notes. The Payment Type must match the account: Cash needs a cash account (Cash or an account under it), Bank a bank account (your main bank account or a branch under it); otherwise saving is refused ("The Cash payment type needs a cash account." / "The Bank payment type needs a bank account."). Other payment types your administrator adds are not checked. Choosing Bank selects the main bank account of Ledger Configuration and Cash the main cash account; you can still pick a branch or another account in the list.
3. Enter the amount paid against each expense.
4. For a bank payment, add the Bank Details. See Bank details on payments.
5. Save as Draft to keep it without changing anything (nothing is posted, the expenses keep their balance and the supplier's balance does not change), or Save and Post to post it now. Posting needs the approve permission; a draft is posted later with Post on its page. See Draft and approved documents.

Exchange rate and exchange gain or loss

A payment in a foreign currency uses the rate in the rate box, filled with today's rate (the latest rate in Currencies); you can change it, for example to the expense's rate. The original rate of the expenses you are paying is shown under the rate box (Bill rate). When it differs from the rate of the expenses it pays, the difference in base-currency value is an exchange gain or loss, shown in the totals box before you save: Exchange Loss when the money paid is worth more in base currency than you owed, Exchange Gain when it is worth less. Each expense clears at its own rate, so a fully paid expense has nothing left in base currency either.

Rules

• Enter an amount for at least one expense, and not more than its amount due ("Expense ... has only 150.00 left to pay.").
• An expense can be paid in any currency. For an expense in another currency, a rate box appears on its line with today's rate of the expense's currency (you can change it), and Off the bill shows what the amount takes off the expense in its own currency. A converted amount a little above the balance due (less than one unit of the payment's currency) pays it in full and the rest is an exchange gain or loss; more is refused.
• With Negative Cash off, a payment that would make a cash account negative is refused. With it on, you are asked to confirm ("This payment creates a negative cash balance. Continue?").
• A payment in a completed bank reconciliation can't be changed until the reconciliation is undone.

Viewing a payment

On the payment's page (and its print and email) each expense line shows what came off the expense in the expense's own currency. When the expense is in another currency than the payment, the amount paid for it in the payment's currency is shown under it, for example 470,000.00 IQD with Paid: 314.00 USD under it.

What it posts

Dr each expense's Paid Through account, usually accounts payable (at the expenses' own rates), Cr the cash or bank account (at the payment's rate), both in the payment's currency. Any difference goes, in base currency, to the Exchange Gain or Loss account set in Ledger Configuration: a debit for a loss, a credit for a gain. Editing the payment posts it again; deleting it reopens the expenses and removes its postings in one step.