Balance sheet and journals

Reports → Balance sheet shows what the business owns and owes at a date you choose: bank balances, money owed to you (debtors) and by you (creditors), VAT, loans, and your capital (opening balance, capital introduced, drawings and profit to date). Assets and equity should always add up to the same total; a Balanced badge confirms it.

The tax return boxes (83 to 99)

Underneath, the same figures are laid out in the balance-sheet boxes of the SA103F self-employment pages. These boxes are optional on the tax return (you don't have to fill them in), but they're a handy cross-check if you or your accountant do.

An overdrawn bank account is a liability, not an asset, so it appears in box 92 (loans and overdrawn balances) rather than box 87. On the cash basis, equipment doesn't build up as an asset on this report (it's an expense on the day you pay for it), so box 83 only shows figures you've added yourself with a journal.

Unexplained bank movements

Money that came in or went out of your bank account but hasn't been explained yet sits in Unexplained bank movements, a temporary holding account. It clears itself as soon as you explain the transaction on Banking → Review; there's nothing to do here directly.

Cash and undeposited funds

Expenses and payments you record without linking them to a bank transaction are treated as paid from cash. If more has gone out that way than came in, Cash and undeposited funds shows under liabilities until you explain the matching bank transactions on Banking → Review, at which point the money moves to the bank account it really came from.

When you need a journal

Most of your books are built automatically from your invoices, bills, expenses and bank transactions. A manual journal is for the handful of things nothing else records:

• Equipment or other assets introduced by the owner (for example, a laptop you already owned brought into the business): debit Equipment and fixed assets, credit Capital introduced.
• A corrected opening balance (if a bank account's opening balance was wrong and you want to fix it without touching the account settings).
• CIS deductions suffered set against your Self Assessment bill (once you've paid a tax bill that's covered by CIS already deducted for you), clear the CIS deductions account against drawings: debit Drawings, credit CIS deductions suffered.

Go to Reports → Journals, pick a date and enter at least two lines with debits and credits that add up to the same amount; the form shows how far out of balance you are as you go, and won't let you save until it's exactly zero.

Who can save a journal

Only owners and admins can add, edit or delete journals. Everyone with access to Reports can see them; on a read-only organisation (trial ended, no plan chosen), journals can be viewed but not changed.

"Does not balance"

If the balance sheet ever shows a warning instead of the Balanced badge, it means something in the underlying records doesn't add up. This shouldn't happen in normal use. Get in touch and we'll look into it.