Balance Sheet Doesn't Balance

 

 

 

The Balance Sheet doesn't balance with itself.

 

There are a number of things you can check:

 

  1. Select the Format button and then Build Format. This will create a new report format using all currently existing GL Account numbers. This insures you of a format where none are omitted or accidentally added into the format more than once.
  2. If this report balances then recheck the correctness of the format of the original Balance Sheet.
  3. If the imbalance remained the same, the format of this financial statement is probably not the problem.
  4. Now run the original report and set the report period to 0.  This will produce a report using only the Beginning Balances of GL Accounts used in the statement format.
  5. If your report doesn’t balance then one or more beginning balances may need to be changed so that it does.
  6. If it balances chances are then that the problem exists in a later period
  7. Then, run this financial statement for each period, one at a time, until your reach the period that doesn’t balance so you can focus your attention on that period.
  8. Cross period transaction should not occur with Active Accounting but if they were to occur, two periods would be out of balance.
  9. If need be run this report changing the period to 13. This will insure all posted transactions are totaled into the report regardless of which period they ended up being posted to. If the report balances then there may be a problem between posting periods
  10. If none of the above steps help, run a General Ledger Transaction Report for the period you are running the Balance Sheet and look for any "Out of Balance" error messages for any accounts on this report.  An error message indicates that the balance for the account showing is different than the total of the activity associated to that account.  In the majority of cases the actual balance amount in the account turns out to be the problem and needs to be changed.  We are referring here to the "G/L Accounts F/M Change Mode form" here.  In any event since the Balance Sheet takes its' amounts from the account balances, any erroneous amount in the account would have an obvious negative effect on the accuracy of the Balance Sheet statement and may be the cause of it being out of balance with itself.  
  11. If none of the steps above bring the source of the problem to light, contact: support@udsgis.com