Expenses with multiple currencies
Mike Alexander
mta at umich.edu
Thu Apr 3 18:40:04 EDT 2008
I don't know if this is completely relevant to your issue (I've been
out of town and just rejoined the list) but you might want to take a
look at <http://www.mathstat.dal.ca/~selinger/accounting/tutorial.html>
and <http://www.mathstat.dal.ca/~selinger/accounting/gnucash.html> if
you haven't already. I have made some changes to GnuCash to mostly
implement these suggestions, but they are out of date right now and
have never been included in any official version.
--
Mike Alexander mta at umich.edu
Ann Arbor, MI PGP key ID: BEA343A6
--On April 2, 2008 8:42:10 PM -0700 Youssef Ltaief <ltai0001 at yahoo.com>
wrote:
> I have windows vista
> where would I write the code? How can I compile it?
>
> Thanks
> Youssef
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>
> To: Youssef Ltaief <ltai0001 at yahoo.com>
> Cc: Daniel Carrera <daniel.carrera at zmsl.com>; gnucash-user at gnucash.org
> Sent: Wednesday, April 2, 2008 9:00:11 AM
> Subject: Re: Expenses with multiple currencies
>
> For the Chart of Accounts.. It's in C.
> The Reports are in Scheme.
> Work would need to happen in both languages to fix this issue.
>
> -derek
>
> Youssef Ltaief <ltai0001 at yahoo.com> writes:
>
>> Unfortunately, that is not an option Derek
>> I would like to be able to look at my expenses in both currencies
>> then have the parent account total in USD. I see that you identified
>> this as a bug so I wasn't missing anything. What programming
>> language do I need to learn to help with this? Youssef
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----
>> From: Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>
>> To: Daniel Carrera <daniel.carrera at zmsl.com>
>> Cc: gnucash-user at gnucash.org
>> Sent: Monday, March 31, 2008 8:37:38 AM
>> Subject: Re: Expenses with multiple currencies
>>
>> I'd argue it's a bug. GnuCash really should understand that "income"
>> and "expense" exchanges are permanent (fixed) and should use the
>> actual transactional exchange rate when reporting, whereas the values
>> of Assets and Liabilities can float as the value of the commodity
>> fluctuates. Unfortunately this means we need to update the way most
>> of the reports work to differentiate between floating commodities and
>> fixed commodities.
>>
>> If anyone wants to get their feet wet with reporting this would
>> be a pretty good way to start, I think. I dont think it would be
>> a very invasive change (but I could be wrong).
>>
>> -derek
>>
>> Daniel Carrera <daniel.carrera at zmsl.com> writes:
>>
>>> If there's another way to do it I would love to hear it. I don't
>>> know about the OP, but in my case I'm not sure that this idea
>>> would work well. My expenses have been about half in CAD and half
>>> EUR. I also have a good portion in GBP.
>>>
>>> Worse yet: I am in Germany, so my choice of base currency should be
>>> EUR. But in a couple of years I'll move to Canada, and my choice
>>> of base currency will become CAD. Switching all the transactions
>>> I've done in a 3 year period to use another currency would be a
>>> lot of trouble.
>>>
>>> So var I've been keeping the expenses separate and just accepted
>>> that I can't track them well. I would love it if I had a way to
>>> use historical exchange rates to get a proper picture of my
>>> expenses, my assets and liabilities.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Daniel.
>>>
>>> Derek Atkins wrote:
>>>> Hi,
>>>>
>>>> My suggestion is to compute the exchange rate when you enter the
>>>> transaction and just report it as a USD expense. E.g.:
>>>>
>>>> Assets:Bank:Bank 2 (EUR) 100?
>>>> Expenses:Bank Charges:Bank 2 $221.47
>>>>
>>>> This will probably be the easier way to do it.
>>>>
>>>> -derek
>>>>
>>>> Quoting Youssef Ltaief <ltai0001 at yahoo.com>:
>>>>
>>>>> Hi,
>>>>> I checked the archive but couldn't find a clear answer to
>>>>> following situation:
>>>>> I have two bank accounts in two different countries with two
>>>>> different currencies (USD and EUR)
>>>>> I have bank expense charges on these two accounts that I get from
>>>>> my statements.
>>>>> I currently have the following setup:
>>>>>
>>>>> Expenses
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges (USD)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges:Bank 1 (USD)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges:Bank 2 (EUR)
>>>>>
>>>>> The problem here is that the total on "Bank Charges" and
>>>>> subsequently "Expenses" is in USD and adjusted according to the
>>>>> current exchange rate which is not correct since the EUR charges
>>>>> were incurred in the past.
>>>>>
>>>>> Should I go with a set up where I separate the Top expense
>>>>> accounts like this instead:
>>>>>
>>>>> Expenses (USD)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges (USD)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges:Bank 1 (USD)
>>>>>
>>>>> Expenses (EUR)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges (EUR)
>>>>> Expenses:Bank charges:Bank 2 (EUR)
>>>>>
>>>>> Suggestions are appreciated
>>>>> Youssef
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
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>>
>> --
>> Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
>> Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board (SIPB)
>> URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/ PP-ASEL-IA N1NWH
>> warlord at MIT.EDU PGP key available
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>>
>>
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