Finance

Journal Entries

Record what the system cannot auto-generate — adjustments, accruals, corrections — with confidence.

Journal entries are the mechanism for recording financial events that the system cannot auto-generate from a source document. Every transaction in Trabalance — whether created manually, produced by a document, or generated on a schedule — ultimately becomes a journal entry that posts to the ledger.

The Journals page — tabs, counts, New and Import, the list, voiding a selection, opening a journal.

Overview — When to Use Journal Entries

Use Case	Type	Who Creates It	Example Entry
Invoice created in Sales	Auto	System	DR Accounts Receivable, CR Sales + Sales Tax Payable
Pay schedule approved	Auto	System	DR the expense accounts chosen per pay item, CR the liability accounts chosen per pay item
Inventory adjusted	Auto	System	DR/CR the item's inventory account, CR/DR the account you pick
Fix a misposted expense	Manual	Accountant	DR correct account, CR wrong account — same amount
Write off a bad debt	Manual	Accountant	DR Bad Debt Expense, CR Accounts Receivable
Accrue unpaid utilities	Manual	Accountant	DR Utilities, CR Accruals
Monthly rent accrual	Recurring	System (scheduled)	A posted journal made recurring — runs every month

The Double-Entry Rule

🚨CRITICAL

Every journal entry must contain at least two lines. The sum of all debits must exactly equal the sum of all credits, and both must be greater than zero. The posting buttons stay disabled until the entry balances. There is zero tolerance for rounding differences.

Example: Invoice for 5,000.00 with 7.4% tax

Sales Invoice — 5,000.00 with 7.4% tax

Account	Debit	Credit	Description
Accounts Receivable	5,000.00	—	Full invoice amount the customer owes
Sales	—	4,630.00	Net revenue recognised (pre-tax)
Sales Tax Payable	—	370.00	Output tax collected on behalf of the authority

Journal Entry Lifecycle

Status	Meaning
Draft	Work in progress. Editable ("Edit and post") or deletable. No financial impact — absent from every report, the ledger and the trial balance.
Posted	Recorded. Lines cannot be changed; a manual journal's narration and reference can be updated. Affects every report from its date.
Reversed	Voided. The journal is marked void and drops out of every report; no offsetting entry is created. It stays visible on the Reversed tab.

The Journals Page

Navigate to: Finance → Journals

Control	What It Does
Tabs	Manual \| Auto \| Reversed \| All \| Draft \| Recurring
Counts	Posted, Draft and (on All / Reversed) Reversed totals for the current list
New	Opens the New Journal Entry form (not on Auto or Reversed)
Import	Bulk upload via .csv, .xlsx or .xls (not on Auto, Reversed or Recurring)
Void	Appears after selecting rows — voids the selected posted journals
Search	Matches number, reference and narration

Table Columns

Column	What It Shows
Journal Number	System-assigned sequential number
Date	Accounting date — determines which period the entry falls in
Source	On the Auto, Reversed and All tabs — the document that produced the journal
Narration	Description of why the entry exists
Created by	User who created it, or System
Status	Draft / Posted / Reversed
Amount	Total of the debit side

Import File Format

The columns are read by position, not by heading, and rows are grouped into journals by their Reference. The full task is on Importing journals.

Column	Required	Notes
Date	Yes	Accounting date for the entry
Reference	No	Groups lines into one journal
Account Code	Yes	Must match an existing account code
Account Name	No	For reference only
Description	No	Line-level description
Debit	Yes*	Leave blank on credit lines
Credit	Yes*	Leave blank on debit lines

Creating a Manual Journal

Click New. The form is titled "New Journal Entry" and is described in full on Manual Journals: a Single Entry / Batch Entry toggle; Center (when centers are on, including "Company-wide (no center)"), Date, Reference and Narration; two or more lines with a searchable account, description, debit or credit; a running Total and Difference; attachments; and the buttons Post & Create New, Save as Draft, Post Journal and Cancel.

Batch Entry

Switch to Batch Entry to queue several journals. Choose Post Entries or Save as Drafts, add each balanced entry to the queue with Add to Batch, edit or remove queued entries in the side panel, then Post Batch (N entries) / Save Batch. Each entry is processed on its own: the result reports how many succeeded and how many failed, so a bad entry does not block the good ones.

Auto-Generated Journals

Every document that carries money produces its journal when it is created; the journal appears on the Auto tab with a Source badge linking back to the document. You cannot create, edit or import auto journals. The full list of what posts is on Auto-Generated Journals.

Recurring Journals

A posted manual journal can be made recurring from its detail page (Make Recurring). The schedule copies the journal's lines on a weekly or monthly cadence, or monthly anchored to a specific date, optionally as drafts. Manage schedules from the journal, from the Recurring tab, or from the schedule's own page. See Recurring Journals.

Voiding a Journal

Posted journals cannot be edited. To take one out of the books you void it — from the list (tick rows → Void) or from the detail page (Reverse). Both do the same thing. The full task, including when to post a correcting entry instead, is on Reversing a journal.

What happens	Detail
Status	The journal is marked void and shows as Reversed
Reports	Its lines drop out of the ledger, the trial balance and every report from that moment
Offsetting entry	None is created — the original is switched off rather than cancelled by a second entry
Audit trail	The journal stays visible on the Reversed tab and, with Audit Trail on, in the account ledger

Find the journal

Finance → Journals, on the Manual or All tab.

Void it

Tick one or more rows and click Void, or open the journal and click Reverse. Confirm "Do you want to reverse this journal?".

Post the correction

If the entry was right but the amount or account was wrong, post a new journal with the correct lines.

⚠️WARNING

To reverse an accrual in the next period — the classic month-end pattern — post a new journal dated in that period with the sides swapped. Voiding the accrual would remove it from the period it belongs to.

Viewing a Journal Entry

Click any journal in the list to open its detail page — summarised here, and covered field by field on Reading a journal entry.

Header: status badge; a Source badge on auto journals; a Reversed badge on voided ones. Actions: Draft → Edit and post, Delete; Posted → Reverse, and Update (narration and reference) on manual journals. New Journal, Duplicate and Print are always available.

Card	Shows
JOURNAL NO.	Sequential number
DATE	Accounting date
REFERENCE	User-supplied reference
ENTRIES	"N lines (X Dr, Y Cr)"

Entries table: Account (links to its ledger), Description, Center (links to the center), Memo/Reference, Debit, Credit, with a Total row. Audit cards: Total Debits and Total Credits, with their line counts. Narration / Note, Recurring Schedule (posted manual journals), and attachments follow.