Overview

'Aged Balance Forward', available in Data Plus Accounts Receivable installations at Update 4.4 or later, is a 'Customer Balance Type' that allows account balances to be summed and aged monthly. This expands the available types of customer balances to the three defined below:

'Open Item' - Transaction detail is kept for all open transactions and aging is done by transaction date.

'Balance Forward' - At month close, all transactions from all months are summed into a single amount. This amount is always aged as "current".

'Aged Balance Forward' - As each month is closed, open transactions for the month are summarized into a monthly total. This monthly total is then aged as of the last calendar day of the month. (A customer may have multiple monthly balance amounts.)

Your customers may all have the same 'Balance Type' or you may choose to use multiple 'Balance Types' based on account and statement information desired for different groups of customers. A 'Balance Type' is required; a customer may only have one 'Balance Type' at any one time.

Credit Balances and Advance Deposits

If a customer is sent for 'Aged Balance Forward' and at the end of a month he has a credit balance, the credit balance is brought forward into the new month and is then applied against any transactions incurred in the new month. If there are no debit transactions in the new month, the credit continues to be brought forward and aged as "current" until there are debit transactions for this customer.

Using the 'Aged Balance Forward' method, 'Advance Deposits' are kept in detail during the month and at month close until they are fully applied against open invoices. Until the next customer Screen 1 of 1 appears; indicating the data has been saved.

Examples

The following sample information shows how transactions for different customer 'Balance Types' are handled over a three month period.

JAN

FEB

MAR

Balance Type

(After 1st Month Close)

(After 2nd Month close)

Open Item

Invoice 1/5 $10

Invoice 1/5 $10à

Invoice 1/5 $10

Invoice 1/6 $25

Invoice 1/6 $25à

Invoice 1/6 $25

Invoice 2/5

$25

Invoice 2/5 $25à

Invoice 2/5 $25

Invoice 2/6 $50à

Invoice 2/6 $50

Balance Forward

Invoice 1/5 $10

Invoice 1/6 $25

à BF013194 $35

Invoice 2/5 $25

Invoice 2/6 $50

à BF022894 $110

Aged

Balance Forward

Invoice 1/5 $10

Invoice 1/6 $25

à BF013194 $35

Invoice 2/5 $25

Invoice 2/6 $50

à BF013194 $35

à BF022894 $75

Summary

Data Plus allows various methods to track customer balances. The most often used 'Balance Type' is 'Open Item', which keeps detail of all open transactions and ages transactions individually by transaction date. If you don’t need or want this level of detail for some or all of your customers, 'Balance Forward' or 'Aged Balance Forward' can be used.

The difference between the two is straight-forward: 'Balance Forward' customers have one lump sum amount at the beginning of each month which is always aged as "current"; 'Aged Balance Forward' customers have a total for each month in which there is an open balance and each total is aged as of the last day of that month.