Transactions Journal
The transactions of a period, one by one: the transaction header, its rows underneath, then totals. It answers "what exactly was posted, and with which rows". If the trial balance says how much and the Nominal Ledger Report says what happened on an account, the journal shows the transactions themselves, whole, with both sides of each posting.
Where to find it: Modules → Nominal Ledger → Reports → Transactions Journal
How to read the report
Each transaction takes several lines:
- the transaction header — number, date, comment and reference. The number is a link: a click opens the transaction itself;
- the transaction rows — account, description, objects, debit and credit. The description is the account name; when a row has its own comment that is not the beginning of the account name, the comment is shown;
- the currency line — under a row in a currency other than the base one: currency code, rate and amounts in currency;
- "Transaction total" — the debit and credit of the transaction. In a balanced transaction they are equal.
For example, an invoice transaction for 1,200.00 including VAT has three rows: Dt 361 1,200.00, Ct 702 1,000.00, Ct 643 200.00 — and a transaction total of Dt 1,200.00 / Ct 1,200.00.
Transactions are grouped by the document they were created from (invoices, payments, goods receipts and so on), and by number within a group. Groups come in a fixed order of the document's internal code, not alphabetically by name. Each group ends with its total; the report ends with "Report total", the number of rows and the number of transactions. Transactions entered by hand come first: a separate "Transactions" group for each year.
Parameters
| Parameter | What it does |
|---|---|
| Period | Which period to take transactions from (by transaction date); required |
| Transaction numbers | One number (57) or a range (10:200); empty — all. The number is matched regardless of the document: 57 shows transaction 57 of an invoice, of a payment and one entered by hand |
| Accounts | Only transactions where at least one row is on these accounts: a comma list, a range 301:399. The code is exact: 36 does not include 361 |
| Objects | Only transactions where at least one row has one of these objects |
| Overview | One line per transaction with its totals — without the posting rows |
| Sort by date | Transactions by date instead of by document and number; there are no document totals then |
| Turnover by accounts | At the end — debit and credit turnover of every account of the report's transactions |
The account and object filters select transactions, not rows: a matching transaction is shown whole, with all its rows. So the debit of a transaction still equals its credit, and the rows show what the selected account corresponds with. Account and object together are matched separately: a transaction qualifies if some row is on the account and some row — not necessarily the same one — has the object.
Worked example
Two documents were posted in a month: invoice No. 1001 for 1,200.00 including VAT and customer payment No. 501 that paid it. Each document produced its own transaction with the same number:
| Transaction | Account | Debit | Credit |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1001 (invoice) | 361 | 1,200.00 | |
| 702 | 1,000.00 | ||
| 643 | 200.00 | ||
| 501 (payment) | 311 | 1,200.00 | |
| 361 | 1,200.00 |
The month's journal without filters. Two groups. "Invoices" — transaction 1001 with three rows and the line "Total: Invoices" Dt 1,200.00 / Ct 1,200.00. "Payments" — transaction 501 with two rows and the same group total. At the end, "Report total" — Dt 2,400.00 / Ct 2,400.00, "Number of rows: 5 · Number of transactions: 2".
Accounts = 702. Only the invoice transaction has a row on 702, so the report keeps transaction 1001 — whole, with all three rows: you can see that the 1,000.00 revenue corresponds with 361, next to 200.00 VAT on 643. The payment is not in the report: none of its rows is on 702.
Accounts = 361. Both transactions: 361 is in the invoice (debit) and in the payment (credit). "Report total" is the same 2,400.00 / 2,400.00 as without the filter: selected transactions are shown whole, so the rows on 702, 643 and 311 go into the total too. The movement on 361 alone is visible in the "Turnover by accounts" table (below) — the 361 line Dr 1,200.00 / Cr 1,200.00, with the corresponding accounts next to it — or in the Nominal Ledger Report.
"Overview". Two transaction lines — one per transaction, each with 1,200.00 / 1,200.00, without the posting rows; group headings and group totals stay. "Number of rows" at the end is the same, 5: the rows of the shown transactions are counted even though they are not displayed.
"Turnover by accounts". Below the journal — a table by the accounts of the report's transactions: 311 — Dt 1,200.00; 361 — Dt 1,200.00, Ct 1,200.00; 643 — Ct 200.00; 702 — Ct 1,000.00; total Dt 2,400.00 / Ct 2,400.00. Account 361 closes at zero: the invoice was issued and paid in the same month.
"Sort by date". The same two transactions — by date, in one group, without the per-document "Total: …" lines; "Report total" does not change.
Export to Excel
In the file the journal is a flat table: a line for every transaction row, with the transaction header (number, date, document, comment, reference) repeated on each line. That makes the table easy to filter and pivot. The file has no per-transaction or per-group totals — only "Report total", the number of rows and the number of transactions at the end. In Overview — one line per transaction. Turnover by accounts goes to a separate sheet.
Common situations
"More than 20000 transaction rows for the period: too many for the detailed journal". The detailed journal shows up to 20,000 transaction rows. Narrow the period or the filters, or switch on Overview — it has no such limit.
A transaction is missing from Overview although the detailed journal has it. Overview skips transactions with zero totals: a one-line transaction without amounts tells nothing.
An account range is refused. A range is written as two bounds with a colon (301:399); if there is no account of the chart in it, the report says so instead of showing an empty journal.
An account range took the wrong accounts. The bounds are compared as text: 30:39 does not take 391 or 3911, and 301:399 also takes the two-digit 31…39. For a group of accounts it is safer to list the codes with commas.
An empty report. No transaction of the period passes all the filters: the filters apply together, with "and".