Bill Payment

Leanne_7663246

Bill Payment Error
Hoping someone can help.  I have an amount sitting as outstanding in the Bills to be pay window. Turns out it is a really old bill from back in 2015.  The bill amount is $2086.38. We paid $2086.38 but for some reason if you go into the bill payment it says in the chq picture $2086.38 but in the breakdown it says amount paid $2035.30.  This is why in the bills to be paid window it has a balance of $51.08 owing.  Normally if you get a glitch like this you can untick and retick the payment and it is ok. This hasn't worked. I have tried re typing the full amount in the amount to be paid and it changes it and you hit save and then go back in and it is back to $2035.30. I can not work out why it is doing this. I dont want to delete and redo the bill given it is so old.  Does anyone have any suggestions.

Kris_Williams

I have had this many times over the years and some I have had to delete the bill and the payment, taking care to write down all details first (I take a photo with my phone these days) and reenter. Have to tick the bill payment in the reconcile window afterwards. I have to say that I have had cases where it has never worked out and just have to live with it, mostly for small insignificant amounts though, - good luck, I understand your frustration 

Leanne_7663246

Thanks Kris,  I was so hoping that this wasnt the case and that there was some miraculous fix.  of course it is a bill that has multiple lines on it which makes it worse. hopefully I dont delete it and then find that it is one of the cases where it doesn't work out.

Jay Jay Li

Hi Leanne, other than what Kris mentioned please check the bill and make sure the bill do not have any negative amount entries made. system can have issues when a tax code and negative amount used in the bill at the same time. 

Leanne_7663246

Thanks Jay Jay. You were right there are negative amounts in the bill.  It was entered before my time so I don't know why it is like that.  Do you have any suggestions on how to balance it out other than delete. I cant change the total given it is previous financial year.

Kris_Williams

You could try memorising it first and call up the memorised transaction rather then retype

John Graetz

Leanne.  As Jay Jay has said, this is a known problem and has been for years.  It has been suggested that one way to overcome this is to enter the negative amounts as a Credit Note and then that tends to take care of it.  It is annoying to see it in the Bills Payable window, but the important thing that you should notice is that this amount does not show up when you run an Accounts Payable report.  As Kris has pointed out, in most cases (in my experience too) attempts to make a correction usually fail, hence the suggestion to enter a Credit Note.
John L G

Leanne_7663246

Thanks John. I know I have had issues over the years with it too but have always managed to fix it.  This one is a stubborn one.  I didnt enter it myself otherwise I wouldn't have entered all the negative and done it as a credit note like you mentioned.  I haven't tried running the accounts payable report must do that though.  I would enter a separate credit note now but given it is previous financial year I am worried about will it effect anything else.  ie if the original bill was dated 30.12.15 and I enter a credit note on the same date will it effect the figures for that financial year.  I am guessing it just offsets the bill but I just want to be 100% sure. Dont want the accountants yelling at me:)

Kris_Williams

No it won’t affect the previous figures - I would print out a trial balance as at 31.12.15, change the bill and do the credit, make changes to applying the credit and when you are happy check the trial balance. I would also take a photo of the original entry before I start

John Graetz

I tend to agree with Kris.  However, in the end I ask this question - is it worth all of the effort to fix something technically, which I believe is not reflected in your Accounts Payable report?  Whilst I am a purist at heart, I have learnt to live with the problem because it does not affect anything financially.
John L G

Kris_Williams

I too agree with John, good luck

Jacksons

Just had the same issue coincidently on bills form 2015

Opened the Bill with the problem

Inserted lines with nil value

Saved the Bill

Error vanished

😁 Yay!