Testing your Chart of Accounts

Contents 1 About this document 2 Testing the chart of accounts 2.1 Test 1. Spreadsheet test 2.2 Test 2. Initial client setup 2.3 Test 3. Testing the accounting process

About this document

This article is part of the How to create a Chart of Accounts module document. It is focused just on the testing of a previously created Chart of Accounts CSV file. Please go back to that document to finish the creation of the module.

Testing the chart of accounts

When the chart of accounts CSV file is defined it can be tested with the following steps.

Test 1 and test 2 verify that the chart of accounts is set up in the right way for the initial client setup process. Test 3 verifies the accounting information generated using the chart of account is the expected one by generating several accounting entries into the ERP.

Test 1. Spreadsheet test

To perform test 1 without loading the chart of accounts in Openbravo ERP, you can download the spreadsheet available in ODS or XLS format.

To perform the test follow these steps:

1. Paste the content of the .csv file in the "Chart" sheet (the second sheet the workbook)
2. Format data in columns with the function Data -> Text to columns.
3. Choose Delimited and "," as separator.
4. Click Finish. Each field now occupies a cell of the worksheet.
5. Examine the first worksheet to look for errors.

If you have the chart of accounts in worksheet format, you can omit steps 1 and 2 and instead paste of the chart of accounts on the Chart sheet.

The testing spreadsheets checks your accounts file for ten common errors:

1. Defaults not defined: checks that the 30 default accounts are defined, this accounts are explained in the chart of accounts document.
2. Account Value not null: checks that there are no account values with null value.
3. Name not null: checks that there isn’t names with null value.
4. Type in domain: checks that the initial letter of the type is “A”, “L”, “O”, “E”, “R” or “M”, the initials of Asset, Liability, Owner’s equity, Expense, Revenues and Memo.
5. Sign in domain: checks that the initial letter of the sign is “D”, “C”, “N” or “E”, the initials of Debit, Credit, Natural and Empty.
6. Document in domain: checks that the initial letter of the document is “Y”, “N” or “E” the initials of Yes, No and Empty.
7. Document not "Y" with default: checks that the accounts with default has the document to Yes.
8. Summary in domain: checks that the initial letter of the summary is “Y”, “N” or “E” the initials of Yes, No and Empty.
9. If Document "Y" summary "N": checks that if the column Document is set to Yes, the column summary must be No.
10. Not Summary must have Parent: checks that the columns that are not summary have a Parent.

The testing spreadsheet does not test for the following conditions, which will also stop the initial client setup, at the create accounts stage.

1. Duplicate Account Values: if an account value occurs more than once. To test for this issue, sort by account value, then create an additional column, with a quick formula like =if(a1=b2;1;0) If the sum of the column is nil, you have no duplicates.
2. Empty lines in CSV: If your CSV file has blank or empty lines like ,,,,,,, at the end, delete them prior to import.

The testing spreadsheet looks like this:

Test 2. Initial client setup

The Initial client setup process creates an entity and loads the chart of accounts. The process tests the chart of accounts and send a message if the format is not correct.

To run it you just need to login into any Openbravo ERP instance as the System Administrator role and go to the Initial Client Setup. Inside this window, create a new client ensuring the Include accounting checkbox is set and browse your filesystem to select the Chart of Accounts file:

If your CSV file has no errors, the process will be completed successfully, otherwise it will show a descriptive error message that will help you to fix the problem.

Test 3. Testing the accounting process

The true test of the chart of accounts is that it produces correct accounting information. The only way to run this test is by posting several transactional documents (invoices, shipments, payments, etc.) into a new client and checking the accounting entries and reports are as you expect.

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