2019-12-23 GnuCash IRC logs

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10:20:56 <mib_tspqdg> heyho - im using gnucash for the first time but im having problem as the balance sheet shows uneven active and passive side - any idea how to find the issue? (ive been searching for wrong bookings all day long....)
10:23:03 <mib_tspqdg> i dont know where to look for further problems
10:28:25 <mib_tspqdg> no on ehere?
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11:15:54 <gjanssens> mib_tspqdg: most likely causes are unrealized gains or currency conversions
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11:24:32 <mib_tspqdg> gjanssens: hey yes i guess i just had the same clues - i was doing balance every months and the discrepancy startet when i added a 2nd bank account in EUR - what do i have to do to fix this issue?
11:25:57 <gjanssens> *that* is another question... Have you tried adding an exchange rate for the EUR currency at the date of your balance sheet ?
11:26:26 <gjanssens> I'm not using either currently, just know this issue pops up from time to time on the mailing lists.
11:27:46 <mib_tspqdg> im searching for such an option however the balance sheet shows me this:
11:27:51 <mib_tspqdg> Wechselkurs € +1.00 CHF +1.1823
11:28:05 <mib_tspqdg> thats actually pretty fine for 31.12.2018
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11:28:31 <mib_tspqdg> em that was 30.6.18
11:28:51 <mib_tspqdg> i just checked tho, it automatically updates the rate for 31.12.2018 it shows me 1.15
11:29:53 <mib_tspqdg> however the difference from active to passive starting from june to december growths to 7000 but it also shows a nonrealized loss of 414
11:30:23 <mib_tspqdg> (passive is 7000 more than active side
11:30:56 <mib_tspqdg> i dont really understand the reasoning how the currency exchange can do that?
11:33:10 <mib_tspqdg> maybe the information that i always manually put the real value in the transaction helps? (imported all bank transactions from chf) we usually change some CHF into EUR when we need to pay bills in EU so let say i changed 25000 so -25000 in CHF account +21715 in EUR account
11:44:45 <mib_tspqdg> any ideas?
12:03:23 <gjanssens> I can't help you there. It's probably worth asking this question on the gnucash-user mailing list. There are lots of other users there which do use the balance sheet.
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12:35:47 <jralls> mib_tspqdg: If you convert 1150 CHF -> 1000 EURand then a few days later convert 1000 EUR -> 1200 CHF then you have a 50CHF realized capital gain. That's a realized gain and you need to recognize it in your books for them to balance.
12:39:32 <jralls> mib_tspqdg: OTOH if you haven't done the second transaction but retrieve the new price then it's an unrealized gain. Some GnuCash reports will show you that if you use the "latest price" price source. Use the "average cost" source to show only realized gains.
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16:24:15 <mib_tspqdg> hey jralls just saw your answer - im actually installing this perl module to autodownload conversions - takes a while, then i will retry to do this - the problem is that i also have some "entrance" in the EUR account that are gain relevant im not sure if booking them into gains directly on the day of income is correct?
16:24:49 <mib_tspqdg> this thing actually takes quite a long time :D
16:26:05 <jralls> Do you mean installing Finance::Quote and all of its dependencies? Yes, that can take a while.
16:26:56 <mib_tspqdg> yep correct its running for 10 mins already
16:27:00 <jralls> For trading gains and losses, you do indeed want to book them on the day that you realize them. You can even do so in the same transaction.
16:27:46 <jralls> https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v3/C/gnucash-guide/chapter_capgain.html
16:28:13 <mib_tspqdg> no not trading - i sold something in EUR and just get the entrance on the EUR account so i book that to the gains with the daily rate right? the problem on end of year the amount of EUR left on the EUR account maybe has another CHF value...?
16:29:28 <mib_tspqdg> im actually just looking for the easiest way to have the balance sheet and the gain loss sheet right for taxes - i dont need fancy realized / unrealized gain loss things (sorry im not a pro here)
16:30:17 <mib_tspqdg> entrance in EUR happens only once in a while, the EUR acc is normally just used to pay our bills as we buy things in EU
16:31:00 <jralls> Doesn't matter what you do with the money. (BTW, the word you want is "entry" not "entrance" ;-) ). Suppose instead converting those 1000€ back to 1200 CHF you'd instead spent them and booked the expense in a CHF account using 1.20 CHF/EUR as the exchange rate. That will still create a trading gain that you need to book even if you don't have to pay taxes on it.
16:31:51 <mib_tspqdg> btw the installer finished - but now when i want to get currencies it fails
16:32:45 <jralls> Taxes and balancing the book aren't necessarily the same thing.
16:32:47 <jralls> https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/FAQ#Q:_Why_doesn.27t_online_quoting_work.3F
16:33:27 <mib_tspqdg> holy *** now that you say that i see that all the expences out of the EUR acc are booked with a 1:1 rate at the moment :O
16:34:08 <jralls> Oops.
16:36:15 <jralls> When you buy something in EUR how do you actually transfer the money? Do you have an EUR bank account that you pay EUR charges with or do you just use a credit card?
16:36:31 <mib_tspqdg> we have an EUR account
16:36:57 <mib_tspqdg> i transfered CHF to EUR and manually adjusted the rate on each transaction (not so many)
16:37:19 <mib_tspqdg> so first thing i have to get this auto rate thingy working i guess?
16:37:47 <mib_tspqdg> do you have any clue on what could be the problem? the installer said all fine and closed - im on windows and can click on the fetch button but then
16:38:23 <mib_tspqdg> after a black windows pops up a second there is a gnucash popup with currency:eur failed
16:38:32 <mib_tspqdg> (in german)
16:38:40 <jralls> You probably *don't* want that. What you really want to do is to convert the expense back to CHF using the same exchange rate as you used to buy the EUR.
16:39:50 <jralls> Did you set up an alphavantage key like the wiki FAQ item says?
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16:40:26 <mib_tspqdg> hmm so the program should do that fifo style?
16:40:30 <jralls> But again, you probably don't want to use the current exchange rate quote.
16:40:32 <mib_tspqdg> are you referring to the wiki in your 2nd link?
16:40:41 <jralls> Yes to the wiki.
16:41:12 <mib_tspqdg> i dont understand what you mean with alphavantage
16:41:35 <jralls> Did you read the wiki link?
16:41:52 <mib_tspqdg> however if you say i dont need that - is there a possibility that gnucash automatically looks up the right rate I used to buy the EUR?
16:42:16 <mib_tspqdg> there is 8 rates in the database from the buying transactions i added manually
16:42:18 <jralls> There is, but it's cumbersome.
16:43:30 <jralls> It uses the Actions>View Lots... dialog. I actually don't know how well or even if it will work for this use case.
16:44:03 <jralls> If you've only 8 EUR buys it would probably be easier to track the price in a spreadsheet.
16:44:37 <mib_tspqdg> but i have a lot more payments in EUR
16:45:00 <mib_tspqdg> so I would have to manually adjust the rate on each of those payments for the expense it generates?
16:45:12 <jralls> Yes.
16:45:51 <mib_tspqdg> but those payments do not cover the buys correctly so what do i do if i buy lets say 100 eur and then 50 eur
16:46:11 <mib_tspqdg> and then i pay 2 bills 1 of 90 and one of 60 eur how do i set the rates for the payments?
16:46:58 <jralls> It's either that or manually calculate the difference between the booked expense in CHF and the cost of the EUR used to pay for it, even more work.
16:47:46 <mib_tspqdg> so what would you do with my example?
16:47:58 <mib_tspqdg> where the payments "use multiple eur buys"
16:48:17 <mib_tspqdg> the second payment uses 10 eur of the first buy and 50 of the 2nd
16:49:28 <jralls> As for how you can either used net average cost or FIFO.
16:49:52 <jralls> That would be FIFO.
16:50:45 <mib_tspqdg> so you would manually calculate the weighted rate for that payment? I mean for 10 payments i can do that but for 1000? must be an automated way no?
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16:53:08 <jralls> Net average cost in this case would use 150/x where x is the sum of your cost in CHF for the two EUR buys. It's a bit more difficult if you'd only used €140 and then bought another €100 and spent €50. FIFO is easier because you always have at most two rates to worry about.
16:54:15 <mib_tspqdg> yes I dont have a problem how to calculate this - but for a lot of payments I feel this should be automated? Am I the only one with this problem? :)
16:56:58 <jralls> As the saying goes, patches welcome. ;-) It's a use-case that comes up from time to time, so you're not the only one but it's not that common. Most users use only one currency.
16:58:04 <jralls> Or they use credit cards and let the CC company deal with the exchange rate and just book everything in the CC's currency.
16:59:10 <mib_tspqdg> (btw is it possible that i still have to apply these 2010 and 2012 patches: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=660383 - i have exactly those error messages when i try to fetch a currency / side note)
16:59:56 <mib_tspqdg> patching this seems hard as i also have some entries in the EUR account from sales in EUR....
17:00:45 <mib_tspqdg> so it seems a bit hard to do that, could i just use a average rate for the payments and somehow then book the difference at end of year?
17:01:22 <jralls> No, you've installed the latest release of Finanace::Quote. That bug is almost 8 years old.
17:01:45 <mib_tspqdg> yep - but i have exactly that popup
17:02:32 <jralls> Yes, but for a different reason that's explained in the wiki article I gave you half an hour ago.
17:03:08 <mib_tspqdg> oh now i got alphavantage sorry its a bit much atm
17:03:45 <jralls> Yahoo! isn't the source for currency quotes anymore... or much of anything else. They closed down that service so the only thing left is yahoo-json.
17:05:35 <mib_tspqdg> ok that part works :)
17:05:43 <mib_tspqdg> could i just use a average rate for the payments and somehow then book the difference at end of year?
17:06:13 <jralls> Sure. It's your book, you can do whatever you want.
17:08:15 <mib_tspqdg> yep if i understand what to do then hehe
17:08:44 <mib_tspqdg> hm it fetches the rate of today not of the date the transaction occured - is that correct or a bug?
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17:10:40 <jralls> That's correct. Historical quotes aren't supported.
17:13:12 <jralls> Those exchange rates quotes are also an average of bid and asked prices over some short period of time on the foreign exchange spot market. They don't actually represent a rate that you could get if you went out to buy or sell Euros.
17:14:15 <mib_tspqdg> yep i saw
17:14:26 <mib_tspqdg> uff im really not sure what the easiest way is to do this now :(
17:16:16 <jralls> Use a credit card for EUR purchases? That way the CC worries about the rates and tells you how much you spent in CHF.
17:17:02 <mib_tspqdg> well first of all I cant pay those things with a credit card - and secondly that wouldnt help for the taxes i have to finish for 2018 :D
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17:17:39 <mib_tspqdg> (i could pay from the CHF account - however that has a lot of charges on every transaction)
17:18:00 <mib_tspqdg> thats why we startet to change larger amounts to EUR and then pay from there
17:18:12 <jralls> OK. Are the currency exchange gains and losses taxable in Switzerland?
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17:19:52 <mib_tspqdg> no not if its not the business purpose
17:20:07 <mib_tspqdg> so not in the amount we are talking of
17:20:53 <jralls> Then for doing your taxes you can ignore the problem. To balance the books just figure out what is the offset and make a correcting entry.
17:27:19 <mib_tspqdg> well the problem is, i still have to add the rates to the transactions on the eur account - so if i add the rates to the 2 entries from eur sales my profit raises in the balance if i set to average rating
17:27:48 <mib_tspqdg> also i still have to add rates to the payments manually to each payment - or can i somehow add an average rate globally?
17:30:08 <jralls> There's no way to edit more than one transaction at a time.
17:31:12 <mib_tspqdg> and no way to define a global rate for EUR of lets say 1.15 for all EUR transactions?
17:34:15 <jralls> Depends on what for. If the latest price in the pricedb is 1.15 then that's what the Accounts page will reflect in rolling the EUR balances into CHF, and what reports will use if you set the price source to latest price. But it won't do anything for fixing CHF account balances that converted Euros at 1.00.
17:34:51 <jralls> For that you either need to make an adjustment transaction or fix every one of the exchange rates.
17:35:32 <mib_tspqdg> so for the payments that have -in the EUR account and +in the expense account
17:35:40 <mib_tspqdg> the expense acc in CHF....
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17:37:21 <mib_tspqdg> so maybe it would be easier to not book directly to the expense account but to some transition account that is still in EUR and then book the expenses in "1 piece" at end of year and set the rate there?
17:39:24 <jralls> That's actually an approach we recommend for businesses that operate in multiple currencies: Have a set of income and expense accounts for each currency.
17:40:13 <mib_tspqdg> under what point would you put those accounts?
17:44:15 <jralls> Probably second level, so Expenses:CHF, Expenses:EUR, Income:CHF, and Income:EUR.
17:45:58 <mib_tspqdg> and at end of year just book the expense and income eur to the CHF to have it on 0 again...?
17:46:34 <mib_tspqdg> and then there will be some gain or loss from the rate difference to the actual bookings?
17:46:41 <mib_tspqdg> or am i misunderstanding something
17:46:45 <jralls> Yeah, close it to Equity just like you do with your CHF income and expenses.
17:49:04 <jralls> Or not. If you don't close books then don't. Make sure that the pricedb has the exchange rate that you want on the last day of the year and the reports will do the right thing.
17:50:23 <mib_tspqdg> oh you mean you just open a eur expense and an eur income account at the same lvl like chf and let them run...? :o
17:52:08 <jralls> If you don't want to categorize the EUR income and expense then yeah, you could do it all to just one account in each. That's orthogonal to closing your books each year.
17:52:41 <mib_tspqdg> hm i wonder if the balance and profit loss reports will be right then lets try :D
18:06:30 <mib_tspqdg> ok now i have a loss ups :D
18:06:44 <mib_tspqdg> also the balance shows a non realized loss?
18:06:50 <mib_tspqdg> i have set to latest rate
18:07:06 <mib_tspqdg> brb
18:09:43 <jralls> Probably because you didn't buy all of the EUR at 1.15.
18:10:12 <jralls> Or whatever the latest rate is.
18:20:18 <mib_tspqdg> yep thats correct - what do i do with that now?
18:22:26 <jralls> If you do a closing transaction you'll need to include a gain/loss split. Otherwise or until then you can ignore it.
18:25:50 <mib_tspqdg> ok if i add forex accounts in the settings the non realized loss is gone - i dont know the mechanic behind it but i think its better for the tax authority :D
18:26:07 <mib_tspqdg> does it add some transaction account in the background?
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18:32:04 <jralls> Do you mean Trading Accounts? Yes it adds accounts and splits that make GnuCash think that the gains are realized. But it also unbalances the book--i.e. the Trial Balance report won't balance--unless you book the gains and losses as income.
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18:35:29 <mib_tspqdg> it actually balances?
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18:36:17 <mib_tspqdg> if i use the average rate tho
18:36:55 <mib_tspqdg> is that a "clean" way for tax purposes?
18:37:02 <jralls> Yes, always use the average cost price source in the trial balance report.
18:38:10 <mib_tspqdg> so now i have to close the book by 1.1.2019 right?
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18:38:38 <mib_tspqdg> to then be able to work on for 2019
18:39:25 <jralls> Only if you want to. GnuCash doesn't care whether or not you close the book. The reports all work on a date range so you can run e.g. a P&L report on the current period to see how things are going.
18:39:56 <jralls> But if you want the Accounts page to reflect just the current period's results then you do need to close the book.
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18:41:06 <mib_tspqdg> is there a how to for that? :)
18:44:45 <jralls> I don't think so. There's Tools>Close Book that will do it for you, but I don't know if it's smart enough to handle multiple currencies.
18:45:48 <mib_tspqdg> ye there i have to specify where to book gains and expenses tho
18:45:53 <mib_tspqdg> i have to open new accounts for that?
18:46:14 <jralls> It just makes two monster transactions that transfer the balance of every Income and Expense account to Equity:Retained Earnings.
18:48:14 <jralls> No, Income and Expenses. The usual place is Equity:Retained Earnings for both. You'll need to create it if you don't already have it.
18:48:43 <jralls> Go ahead and try it. If it goes wrong it's simple to just delete the two transactions.
18:49:30 <mib_tspqdg> :D
18:53:43 <jralls> GTG
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19:12:39 <mib_tspqdg> ok lets try :D
19:19:27 <mib_tspqdg> it tells me i have to chose an equity account to book to
19:19:56 <mib_tspqdg> and i cant chose any so i guess i have to create one for that
19:22:36 <mib_tspqdg> in that account then it shows me a loss of 501
19:23:17 <mib_tspqdg> but in the balance i had a profit of 358 i guess it doesnt use the same rates and stuff like in the reports?
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