Posting Settings- Creating a Posting Journal Per What?

First, I should take a moment to explain Steve's recent absence from blogland. No, he is not slacking, but rather taking care of the newest addition to his growing brood. He and his wife added daughter number two in recent weeks. I will let him trumpet her arrival when he returns full force to the blog, and in the meantime you will be subject to my less-technical posts on the wonders of Dynamics GP :)



When training new power users on Dynamics GP, I emphasize the significance of the posting settings window (Tools>>Setup>>Posting>>Posting) as the control center of subledger posting. In particular, I like to point out the "Create a Journal Entry Per" setting.

This setting actually enables three different posting methods for the subledger origin specified:

• Transaction: Post a separate journal entry for each transaction in the batch, this is often referred to as "posting in detail"
• Batch: Post one summarized journal entry for the entire batch, this is referred to as "posting in summary". This option also limits the "Posting Date From" option to "Batch" only.
• Batch, mark "Use Account Settings": This option lets you mix and match posting in detail and summary based on individual account settings by series, Cards>>Financial>>Account. You can then set whether the account should be posted to in detail or summary based on series. Keep in mind, these settings are only used when a Series and Origin is set to "Create a Journal Entry Per: Batch" and "Use Account Settings" in Posting Setup.

So why post in detail -vs- summary? Well, I typically advocate for detail unless there is tremendous volume and it would never actually be used. When posting in detail, valuable originating information (like Originating Master ID, Originating Master Name, and Originating Document Number) is passed to the general ledger and is accessible through SmartList>>Financial>>Account Transactions. This originating information would include the vendor ID, vendor name, and document number for a payables transaction, for example. Very valuable when reconciling or researching in the general ledger.

Just a couple reminders before I wrap up. If you access Posting Setup, make sure you pick a specific Origin to view your settings. The view will default to the Origin of "All". This Origin is used to rolldown changes to all origins in the selected series. For example, if you change to "Create a Journal Entry Per: Transaction" for the Origin of "All" and save, it will update all origins in the series. It does NOT prompt you for the rolldown, it just does it. Also, the Origin of "All" will never reflect your true setup, since each Origin can be different. The Origin of "All" will always show the default settings. For this reason, and to avoid accidentally changing all of your posting settings for a series, always select a specific Origin when viewing your settings.

My final reminder is that the Posting Setup window is critical to the successful use of the system, and one inadvertent change can negatively impact your ability to access information. For example, if someone unmarks "Post to the General Ledger" the selected subledger origin will not create any GL transactions. For this reason, be very careful when accessing this window and limit who can access it to avoid undesired changes.