Edit or Delete a Book Entry

You just entered a book entry but made a mistake. No worries — you can edit or delete it.

This article walks you through how to do it.

• Finding an existing book entry
• Editing a book entry
• Deleting a book entry

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Finding an existing book entry

You'll need to locate the entry first. There are two ways to do this.

Method 1: Use the search option

Go to Accounting > Search.

On this page, you can search using several filters, including:

• Entry type: Revenue, Expenditure, Payments, etc.
• Account: filter by the accounts in your chart of accounts
• Dates and amounts

Check out this article for more details on how the search module works.

Example: I want to find a book entry linked to the "Membership" account between January 1 and May 3, 2021.

Method 2: Search from accounting documents

You can also search from the Journal or the General Ledger, both accessible under Accounting > Documents.

From there, you can filter the displayed entries by date, journal sub-categories, account, and more.

Editing a book entry

Once you've found the entry, click Detail (the eye icon) next to it. The entry detail panel will open, where you can make your changes.

There are 2 types of records:

• An expenditure/revenue entry
• One or more payment entries

To edit a record, click Edit, make your changes, then click Save to confirm.

Expenditure/revenue entries

For an expenditure/revenue record, you can edit:

• The label
• The linked account
• The purchase date
• The amount
• Advanced options: prepaid portion, link to a member, etc.

For more information, check out the article on the entry module.

Payment entries

The process is the same for editing payment information. You can:

• Indicate whether the payment has been received or not;
• Edit the date, amount, payment method, and bank account fields.

When editing is not possible

Editing a book entry isn't always possible. Certain restrictions are in place to ensure the integrity of your accounting.

The entry belongs to a closed accounting period

If your accounting period has been closed, your ending balances (C/FWD) have already been carried forward to the next period. Editing an entry would throw your books off balance, which is why changes are blocked.

You can still edit the entry by reversing the closing of the relevant accounting period. Once done, simply close it again to apply the changes across all your periods. For more information, see this article.

The entry was automatically generated

To save you time and simplify your accounting, certain entries are created automatically.

When a period is closed, C/FWD entries are generated to carry forward the balances of key accounts to the next period. To prevent any inconsistencies, these entries cannot be edited. To learn more, check out this article on accounting closing.

The entry is linked to a transaction

Similarly, an entry linked to a transaction (membership, donation, or purchase) may not always be editable.

• Offline payment: You can edit the payment information in the entry and update certain fields from the transaction. However, the revenue amount cannot be changed.
• Online payment: Entries for payments collected through the e-wallet (credit card/direct debit) are generated automatically once a month and cannot be edited.

If there's an error in an online payment amount, you can issue a refund. The process for memberships is described in this article.

Deleting a book entry

How to delete a book entry

If you notice a duplicate entry or one that no longer needs to exist, you can delete it in two ways:

• Delete the payment entry only: click Edit, then Delete;
• Delete both entries: click the Delete all button.

Clicking Delete on an expenditure/revenue entry will delete both the expenditure/revenue entry and the associated payment entry.

When deletion is not possible

The entry belongs to a closed accounting period

As with editing, you'll need to reverse the closing of the accounting period before you can delete an entry.

The entry was automatically generated

Likewise, C/FWD entries cannot be deleted.

If the entry is linked to a transaction, you'll need to delete it directly from the transaction detail page by clicking Delete all.

A receipt or invoice has been issued

To preserve the validity of issued documents, entries linked to the relevant transaction cannot be deleted. This restriction is in place to ensure the reliability of your accounting.

In this case, clicking Delete all will automatically generate a credit note to reverse the entry in your books.

Go further

Want to take your entries further? Check out these articles:

• Managing accounts payable and receivable
• Grouping payments
• Managing cash deposits and withdrawals
• Check deposit slips
• Automatically generated book entries
• Entering a refund / credit note entry