General Ledger vs Sub Ledger Top 9 Differences with Infographics

A fixed asset subledger is used to convey details of a company’s fixed assets, such as property, equipment, vehicles, and software. For example, the entries here can reflect the asset’s original cost, any additional costs, and possibly restatement or revaluation costs. The bank accounts subledger records the cash that is available in the company’s bank accounts and short-term investments. The total of all the accounts in this subledger will indicate the amount of cash-on-hand the company has at a given moment. In the above example of the 2,000 AR transactions, all these transactions would be listed in the customer accounts subledger, the total of which would populate the accounts receivable balance in the general ledger for that month. As companies scale, they may find that keeping all the detailed financial data about each transaction in the general ledger is cumbersome and unworkable. For example, if your business has 2,000 transactions in AR in a given month, your accounting clerk would need to go through all those entries to find the total.

The general ledger is the complete record of every financial transaction your company undertakes. Why is it required to prepare subledger–general ledger reconciliations? When we say we’re “balancing the books,” the general ledger is what we’re referring to.

How to reconcile the general ledger

Guide your business with agility by standardizing processes, automating routine work, and increasing visibility. The Payables to Ledger Reconciliation report integrates with the AP Trial Balance report. Use the Payables Trial Balance report to obtain the beginning and ending payables accounting balances and drill down to the details. The summary level of the reconciliation reports contains data that is aggregated at the point in time the data extraction program is run. Expand account balance information from summarized to detail data for optimal reconciliations. Identify the differences between the subledger and general ledger, decide if a correction is necessary, and in which of the two the correction should be recorded.

Automated reconciliation of key payables and receivables subledger balances to the general ledger. The next step is to make necessary adjustments to the G/L or to sub-ledger based on the reconciliation to correct any errors, omissions, etc. To identify what needs to be adjusted, you could use the template of the general ledger to sub-ledger reconciliation statement presented above. Manual posting is the biggest bottlenecks of the closing process; between 60% and 70% of reconciliation work is performed by the preparers. Therefore, the key to removing the manual burden is auto-certification. Hackett Group analysis suggests the superior efficiency of top performing companies is down to greater use of process and technology-related best practices and automation of many traditionally manual tasks.

General Ledger

Academics estimate that almost nine out of 10 spreadsheets contain errors. Low risk accounts are then typically reconciled outside of the financial close because they would not substantially impact the accuracy of the financial numbers. The foundation of quality financial information is in the detail data recorded at the general ledger level. https://online-accounting.net/ Reconciliations serve as a key element of a system of internal control and are required by state policy. Compare the ending balances reflected on both sources, ensuring that the dates align. If the balances are the same, it’s still worth completing the reconciliation to ensure there aren’t offsetting errors within the transactions.