Reckon Accounts Personal Plus 2015 - Reports use wrong exchange rate

David H
David H Member Posts: 23
I'm using Reckon Accounts Personal Plus 2015 Release R1, Australian Edition.

A register report in AUD of accounts with multiple currencies shows the transactions in the non-AUD accounts converted to AUD at the current exchange rate, not the exchange rate applying at the time of the transaction.

You can test this very simply:
  1. Create two cash accounts, one in AUD and the other in USD, or use existing accounts if you don't mind creating and deleting a few transactions.
  2. Transfer AUD1000 from the AUD account to the USD account on several different dates for which you know you have exchange rates. For convenience, include something unique in the memo field to make it easy to select only these transactions, for example zzCurrencyTest.
  3. Run a register report in Australian dollars including just these two accounts and select only the transactions you've just entered.
The report should show two lines for each transfer, one line for each account, and, as the report currency is AUD, all amounts should be $1,000.00 and the Net Total should be $0.00.

I've attached a report I ran on 2 Feb.

image

The first transaction on 1 Jan 2014 shows in the USD account as 892.50, which is as you'd expect because the historical exchange rate from 1 Jan 2014 is 0.8925. The report shows the 1 Jan 2014 USD account transaction amount as AUD1,147.50. That is USD892.50 converted to AUD at the exchange rate on the date I ran the report, i.e. 0.77778. The rest of the transactions are similarly wrong, with each converted to correctly in the accounts and displayed incorrectly o the report.

I ran the same report again today. It now reports the 1 Jan 2014 USD account amount as 1,142,24, which is the amount converted at ?today's? exchange rate.

Unlike the Portfolio Cost Basis and Value Report, the register report has no check-box next to the currency for Transaction Exchange Rate, so it's not a report parameter selection issue that I can see.

Surely this is a bug? Reckon Accounts keeps a full currency exchange rate history. It uses that history to calculate the currency amount when entering a?? transaction that transfers between two accounts in different currencies. That's what it did when I entered those five transactions above. It also seems to use the history for the Portfolio Cost Basis and Value Report.

Reckon, why doesn't it use the history for the register report? This makes any form of transaction reporting across multiple currencies quite useless. The value of an amount is the value it was on the date of the transaction, not the value of the same amount at today's exchange rate.

Or is there something that I'm missing?

regards - David

Comments

  • John Campbell
    John Campbell Member Posts: 193 ✭✭
    edited February 2017
    If you want to lock in a conversion rate, aren't you transferring the funds from a US account to an Australian account ? You should not be retaining the funds in a US currency account.
  • David H
    David H Member Posts: 23
    edited February 2015
    John, I used the example above because it's the simplest way of demonstrating that the report is not using the right exchange rate.

    For an account balance of a foreign currency account, using today's exchange rate to report in Australian dollars is the correct approach.

    For a transaction in a foreign currency account, you have to use the exchange rate that applied on the date of the transaction to convert to Australian dollars. For example, you might earn interest in a foreign currency account and have to report it in Australian dollars for tax. And I'm assuming that forex gains and losses don't apply, i.e. these are small enough amounts for that to not apply.

    I just want the $A amount to be "right".

    So, Reckon, can you please shed some light on this?
  • David H
    David H Member Posts: 23
    edited February 2015
    Thanks for clearing that up. So, I won't be expecting a satisfactory response from Reckon!
    I could use Excel and lookups into historical exchange rates. Seems farcical when this product is supposed to be multi-currency.