Journal Validation

All journals must be valid before they are added to the Valid Journal Transaction File and posted to the Account/Center Master File.  Journal transactions are added to the transaction file in four ways:

1.   Online manual, manually selected recurring, and intercompany journals are added immediately to the Valid Transaction File as each journal is ended.  Invalid transactions are added to the file only after they are corrected. 

2.   Standing journals on the Recurring/Standing Journal Transaction File are added to the Valid Transaction File when Select Standing Journals is selected on the GLMENU.

3.   Subsystem and batch journals are added to the Valid Transaction File when Subsystem Journal Entry is selected on the GLMENU.

4.   Adjustment journals are posted to the Account/Center Master File and added to the Cumulative Transaction File when Adjustment Journal Post is selected from the GLMENU.

To be valid, an online journal must satisfy the following conditions:

·     Its status must be closed.  That is, a successful end of journal must have been executed.

·     Unit of measure codes on transactions recording statistical amounts must be valid.  Each code must match either the unit-of-measure code on the account specified or a unit-of-measure translation record on the Reference File.

·     Intercompany accounts must be specified for all location combinations on intercompany journals.

·     Each currency code must match the currency code on the account specified, if the account currency code is not 999.

·     Override exchange rates must not differ from the standard exchange rate by more than the override exchange rate limit when an override exchange rate is specified for foreign currency journals.

·     Account and center numbers for each transaction in the journal must be valid and active on the Account/Center Master File.  In addition, the account and center cannot be restricted to subsystem transactions.

·     The actual transaction count, debit amount, and quantity amount must equal control amounts.

·     Total debits must equal total credits.

·     The journal number must not be entered previously for posting in the current period.

In order to tighten control when creating a journal number automatically, an unused file will be created to hold any journal numbers assigned to a transaction that was either canceled or aborted.  As a result, the journal number will not be lost if the transaction ended in error or was canceled.  At the time the company/location is validated, Reference File category 132 will be read to determine how to assign the next journal number.  There will be two options:

·     Automatically read the Unused Number File.  If any numbers exist, use the first number as the next journal number and delete this number from the Unused Number File.  If the file is empty, retrieve the journal number from Reference File category 136 and update it with the next number.

·     Do not read the Unused Document Number File.  Retrieve the journal number directly from Reference File category 136 and update it with the next number.

You will be able to select the unused number from a window by pressing F4 when the cursor is positioned on the Journal Number field on the Function Select screen.

When valid online journals and batch standing and subsystem journals are added to the Valid Transaction File, a number of processes are automatically performed.  Unit of measure conversions are performed for transactions when the quantity entered has a different unit of measure than the quantity on the Account/Center Master File.  Statistical transactions are generated for transactions when financial and statistical amounts are entered on one line.  Foreign currency transaction amounts are converted to the base currency.  Reversing journals are generated for a subsequent fiscal period for journals that will be posted in one period and reversed in the subsequent period.  This processing provides more complete information about the journals processed each period.

All subsystem and batch journals must be validated.  These functions are handled by the Subsystem and Batch Journal Validation Program (GL030P).  To be in balance, a batch must satisfy the following conditions:

·     All transactions within the journal must be for the same location as the header record.

·     Accumulated transaction counts and debit amounts must equal control amounts on the header record.

      If VAT is being calculated for the journal, then the journal transaction control totals will contain both the entered amount as well as the VAT amount.  Therefore, the transaction control number will be increased by one for each VAT line that is generated.  You should consider the number of automatically generated VAT lines when entering the control total number of lines.

·     Accumulated debits must equal accumulated credits.

Invalid subsystem and batch journals are added to the error correction file accessed by the Journal Validation Conversation.  These invalid journals can be reviewed, updated, and deleted through this conversation.  These journals are not made available to subsequent inquiry and reporting processes until they are corrected.

All adjustment journals must be valid.  The functions are handled by the Adjustment Journal Program (GL050E) and the Adjustment Journal Post Program (GL230P).  To be valid, adjustment journals must satisfy the online journal validation conditions plus the following conditions:

·     The fiscal period/year value must be less than the current fiscal period/year value.

All adjustment journals must be valid before they can be accepted by the Adjustment Journal Validation Program.  The value of adjustment journal line items that are rejected by the Adjustment Journal Post Program is booked to the suspense account for the specific location.  The rejected line items should be investigated and correcting adjusting journals processed before continuing system processing.

·     If you are using the management reporting option (Management Account Reporting flag on Reference File category 133 set to Y), a reporting class (F, M, or C) must be associated with each journal.

Fiscal journals can only have fiscal accounts, managerial journals can only have managerial accounts, and common journals can only have common accounts.  The only exception is the suspense account which may be entered in any journal (see Suspense Account Processing in the Key Concepts section of this manual).