How do I add a General Ledger (GL) account?

Accounts (General Ledger accounts) are where you post balance sheet, income statement, and statistical transactions.

Accounts (General Ledger accounts) are where you post balance sheet, income statement, and statistical transactions. Accounts make it easier to keep track of the transaction type, such as Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, Inventory, and their various subaccounts. The list of all of a company's General Ledger accounts is called its Chart of Accounts.

1. Go to General Ledger > All > and click Add beside General Ledger Accounts. The General Ledger Accounts page appears
2. View detailed field descriptions

Field	Description
Account number	You see this field if you do not use subaccounts. Enter the primary account number. This number must be a specific length, which is set on the Accounting tab of the Company Information page. For example, if your system uses account numbers that are 4 characters long, you can create an account number of 1024, but not 10245. The account number length might differ between companies. This number cannot be changed after the account is saved, unless you allow changes to account numbers and you have permission to make such changes. Best practices for creating account numbers
Primary and subaccount numbers	You see these fields if you use subaccounts. Enter the primary account number as described above, and enter any subaccount numbers that you want (subaccounts are optional). We recommend using dimensions instead of subaccounts as a method of organizing accounts. This greatly simplifies reporting and avoids possible confusion when rolling up for reports, because subaccounts aren't included in roll ups in reports. For the same reason, if you use subaccounts we recommend that you do not put amounts into the parent GL accounts. Learn more about dimensions. As with primary account numbers, subaccount numbers must be a specific length, which is set on the Accounting tab of the Company Information page. For example, if your system uses primary account numbers that are 4 characters long and subaccount numbers that are 3 characters long, you can create account numbers such as 1024-100 or 1024-100-300-400. Subaccount box sizes do not change based on the number of characters they can hold. On the page, they appear large enough for 3 characters, but they accept more if your subaccount length is longer than 3. Each box is a different subaccount. Account numbers cannot be changed after the account is saved, unless you allow changes to account numbers and you have permission to make such changes. More about subaccounts
Title	Enter the name of the account. This is the title that appears on report headings. Example: "Assets."
QuickStart Category	The Category field is available only for companies that were created with a QuickStart template or chose one later. Categories are permanently preassigned to account groups, which are used in pre-designed financial reports and graphs. If enabled, select a category for the account. Based on the category selection, the account automatically prefills Account type, Normal balance, and Period end closing type. For example, you would assign the Petty Cash account to the category Cash and Cash Equivalents, which is assigned to the Cash and Cash Equivalents account group and appears on financial reports and graphs that contain this account group. If you don’t want this account to be in your financials, delete the text in this field so it's blank. ' Categories are part of the QuickStart template, and are included in the chart of accounts import template. Use the template to import chart of account information, including the categories assigned to your accounts. You can't create new categories. Using a Services QuickStart setup template? If you need to assign categories to many accounts, the easiest way is to export your chart of accounts, make the changes in the Excel upload template, and then upload the file.
Account type	Select an account type: Balance sheet account: Snapshot of the current state of a company's assets, liabilities, and equity at a specific time. Income statement account: Sometimes called Profit and Loss statements, these are cumulative for the selected period.
Normal balance	When you create an account, you specify whether the normal balance, from an accounting standpoint, is a debit or credit. For example, expense accounts are normally a debit. Sales accounts are normally a credit. If you were to run a Trial Balance report, the normal balance of the account is what determines whether the account is a credit or debit.
Period end closing type	Specify whether the account is a closing or non-closing account. This determines whether activity in the account is included in your Close Into Account (which you specify in the Close into account field). On reports, your Close Into Account shows period end totals calculated through a 'virtual close'. For more information about how period end totals are calculated due to a virtual close, see Close books. Income statement accounts should be closing accounts. Balance sheet accounts should be non-closing accounts.
Close into account	For income statement accounts, enter the account into which they close. Depending on your organization type, you'll typically use one of the following as your Close Into Account: Retained Earnings.Use this if your organization is a for-profit company. Net Assets.Use this if your organization is not for profit. Sage Intacct zeroes closing accounts into your Close Into Account at year-end, but does not create closing entries. Instead, period end totals are calculated when you run reports. Do not create manual closing entries, and do not post directly to the Close Into Account. This will cause incorrect period end totals to be calculated on reports
GL account alternative	To set up this account so it can be used as an override of the default AP or AR GL account, select the type of GL account that it can override: Payables account: adds the account to the filtered list of AP GL accounts available as override accounts for bill and adjustment transactions, and transactions involving a specific vendor. Receivables account: adds the account to the filtered list of AR GL accounts available as override accounts for invoice and adjustment transactions and transactions involving a specific customer. You can set up any account as an available override account, but typically you use AR or AP accounts. As you enter transactions, you can select the same alternative GL account for all line items, or select alternative accounts individually per line item. In Vendor and Customer pages, you can select 1 alternative GL account to use for balancing all transactions involving the vendor or customer. If you override the default account for a transaction, the override account you used can never be deleted or have its status set to Inactive. Also, the account will always remain available as an override account. This field applies only to bills, invoices, and adjustments. It doesn't apply to recurring bills or invoices, manual payments, manual deposits, or advances.
Tax return code and M-3 return code	This option is only displayed if you enabled tax codes in the General Ledger Setup page. If you use 3rd-party software applications to prepare client tax returns, enter the tax code in the Tax return code box to map tax codes to the tax forms you need to use. (Whether you fill out 1 or both of these tax code boxes depends on which item or items your tax software requires.) For example, if you use Thomson Reuters GoSystem Tax, and you want to map tax return codes to a tax form (such as Form 1120, Form 1065, etc.), you must enter the Tax return code box. Similarly, to map M-3 return codes to your M-3 form, you must enter the M-3 return code box.
Status	Accounts can be active or inactive. Inactive accounts are not used in calculating allocations, and they do not appear in list pages, dropdown lists, or pick lists. (You can still list inactive accounts by clicking the Include inactive checkbox.) You cannot make a GL account inactive if the account is selected in the configuration page of an application or if it's being used in a budget.
Disallow direct posting	Select Disallow direct posting to prevent direct entry of journal entries to the subledger control account (for example Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, etc.). Use this control to ensure that the account balance for the subledger account is accurate and has the necessary subledger details supporting the figure, rather than a direct entry which would not be reflected in the subledger application area.
Require dimensions	In this section, select checkboxes to require dimensions for transaction entries assigned to this account. All selected dimensions will be required. What are dimensions?

3. If you set up reporting accountsthat represent alternate charts of accounts, you can use the Reporting accounts mapping section to map GL accounts. Learn about other tools for mapping reporting accounts.

"Reporting accounts" is an optional feature in the General Ledger that enables you to generate and display reports using account sets other than your General Ledger accounts. This is most common for companies that have clients, owners, or other governing bodies who need to see reports in their own charts of accounts.

4. Click Save.

To save this record and create another one, click Save & New. Another blank Information page appears for you to enter the name and description of the next record you want to add.