Introducing the Cashbook

The Cashbook is a fully integrated application giving constant, up-to-date information on any number of bank and petty cash accounts that have been created within the Nominal Ledger. The Cashbook application can only be installed on systems that include the Nominal Ledger.

In addition to the existing payment routines within the Purchase Ledger, payments and refunds can be made from the Cashbook. These payments, receipts, refunds, and inter-bank transfers on the Cashbook can then be reconciled against bank statements. Standing orders, direct debits and other recurring bank transactions can be set up to be automatically handled by the Cashbook. Sales Ledger receipts and refunds can also be posted from the Cashbook.

If you have more than one company in operation, it is also possible to consolidate the Sales and Purchase Ledger of each company into the Cashbook of a nominated company of your choice. This means that more than one Sales and Purchase Ledger can be linked to the same Cashbook and Nominal Ledger. The Cashbook is directly linked with the target Nominal Ledger of the same company identifier. Therefore, when you specify to link to a particular Nominal ID in the Options screen of the Sales and Purchase Ledger, you also link to the same Cashbook ID. In this case you cannot have a Cashbook in the source company.

The Monitor Companies form in the System Manager also displays an overall balance for all your bank accounts in the Cashbook.

The balance is updated whenever a receipt or payment is posted to a bank account if the Update Company Balances option is ticked on the System Preferences form in the System Manager.
The balance can also be updated 'by hand' by using Calculate Balances command on the Monitor Companies form.

The Cashbook is structured into the following sections:

Section	Description
Processing	This section is where you maintain your Bank Account information You can maintain bank accounts in different currencies to allow for multi-currency transactions. This is where receipts and payments are posted to the banks, recurring postings are set up, transactions are matched up with each other and your bank statements are reconciled to the transactions in the application.
Batch Processing	This section is where batches of receipts and payments are posted to bank accounts. You might find this useful if you have already banked a collection of receipts and want to enter them in the cashbook from a manually written paying-in slip. When a batch is complete, you can mark it as complete so you can create a new batch, however, you can reopen completed batches for editing, for example to add a missing transaction.
Reports	This section provides listings of records maintained in the Cashbook application. These include lists of records maintained through the various forms and transactions generated as a result of cashbook postings and other transaction processes. Reports can be used to view information on your computer screen as well as printing. You can also create BACS and Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) files from here. Most reports provide a number of options to determine the criteria, sequence and range of records reported. Some reports can also be saved as Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. For a complete list of those reports, see the Printing and Reporting Help topic.
Utilities	This section is where you choose the settings for the Cashbook, remove old transactions from the database, post recurring entries that were previously set up and post opening balances to the bank accounts.
Maintenance	This section is where you define your Cashbook Type codes for receipts and payments and payee names to record details of payees for cheque, BACs and Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) payments.

How the Cashbook links to other modules

The Cashbook is automatically linked to the Nominal Ledger. The Cashbook can also link to the Sales Ledger and Purchase Ledger modules. Information is passed to or from the Cashbook either in Real Time or by Batch Update routines. The Sales Ledger and Purchase Ledger modules only link to the Cashbook if an option is ticked on the System - Maintenance - Company Profiles form:

If the Sales Ledger to Nominal Ledger option is ticked, the Sales Ledger is linked to both the Nominal Ledger and the Cashbook.
If the Purchase Ledger to Nominal Ledger option is ticked, the Purchase Ledger is linked to both the Nominal Ledger and the Cashbook.

Foreign Currency Bank Accounts

An optional feature of the Nominal Ledger and Cashbook is foreign currency bank accounts. This allows bank balances to be held and transactions to be posted in a currency other than the home currency.

Advanced Nominal

The Advanced Nominal Ledger must be purchased as an additional application to be used in conjunction with the standard Nominal Ledger. As the name suggests, it offers advanced analysis, reporting, enquiry and drill down capabilities. It is intended for customers who require more sophisticated or flexible financial analysis.

The Advanced Nominal offers two extra dimensions or 'floating' codes not tied to the Nominal Ledger Account as Cost Centres are. These are optional and therefore make the Advanced Nominal more adaptable. When analysing data there is greater choice and flexibility by using Cost Centres, Departments, Projects and the Nominal Account.

Reporting can be instant, with the introduction of definable Views with drill-downs. There is the ability to report on a year and period ranges, giving customers greater flexibility when interrogating data. For detailed information about this feature, see the Advanced Nominal Ledger Help topic.