Charge Account Payments

A Charge Account Payment is a disbursement of money from a charge account. Unlike other payment types, instead of being charged to a bank account, this is charged against a charge account, which is a liability. When a charge account payment is processed in Shepherd's Staff, the charge account used will be increased by the amount of the payment, by crediting the charge account.

In turn, the offset accounts you use will all be debited. Typically the accounts that are used on the debit side of a charge account payment are expense, dedicated, and sometimes, another liability. A debit will increase, decrease and decrease these accounts respectively.

Charge account payments will have one of the following statuses:

» Paid — The charge account payment has been written, and its line items are affecting the balance of the accounts you used in the transaction. Paid charge account payments may be edited within the fiscal year they were written in.

» Pending — The charge account payment has been written, but is not yet being applied to the accounts used within the transaction. Use this if you want to write out a charge account payment in advance, but you don't want it applied to your books yet.

» Void — The charge account payment has been voided, and all of its line items have been reversed, setting the payment to $0.00. Charge account payments from a prior fiscal year cannot be voided; they must be stopped.

» Stop Payment — Stopping a charge account payment saves the details of the payment, and creates a reversing journal entry to provide an audit trail. The reversing journal entry  is dated with the current date.

Note: Charge Account Payments cannot be marked as cleared, as they typically do not affect an asset account, and the bank account reconciliation utility will only show transactions that affect the bank account you are reconciling.

• Charge account payments can be added, edited, copied and voided within the Payments window. You can filter to see just your  charge accountvpayments by going to the "Filter" box and selecting "By charge"
• This grid will show your charge account payments, with their Document number, date, amount, description, status, vendor, which bank account it was paid from, if there is a note on the check, and its internal transaction ID.
• You can select which book's charge account payments you're viewing in the "Book" drop list, and you can select which charge account's payments you're viewing in the "Account" drop list.
• By default, this view will show the last 24 months of charge account payments. If you wish to see beyond that, uncheck the "Last 24 months" checkbox.
• Click the "Add" button to add a new payment. Choose the "Charge account" option, to create a new charge account payment.

1. At the next window that appears, select which charge account you want to write the charge account payment from. This will be sorted by account number, but if you wish to sort by name, check the "Sort by name" checkbox. Click select once you've clicked on the charge account you wish to use.
2. In the window that appears, you'll see the charge account you selected in the top left corner. In the top right corner, you'll see the total for this payment.
3. The "Pay by" drop list will let you switch between payment types. If you switch to a check or EFT, you'll be prompted to choose which bank account the check or EFT should be charged against.
4. In the "Payee" field, you'll select which payee this charge account payment is for. If you need to add a new Payee, click the green plus button to be taken to the payee window to add a new payee.
5. After selecting the payee, if you need to repeat the last payment you created for them, click the "Get last payment" button. Note, that if the last payment to this vendor was coming from a different bank account or charge account, you will receive a warning, in case this check is supposed to go against that bank or charge account instead.
6. Next, set the charge account payment status. If this should be applied to the balances right away, choose "Paid". If this is a payment that will be applied later, choose "Pending".
7. For any additional description you want beyond what accounts are used, fill in that information in the "Description" field.
8. In the dark gray area of the window, you can enter the line items for your charge account payment. In the account drop box, you can select which account you'd like to use as an offset account. By default, only liability, expense and dedicated accounts can be selected, but if you click the filter button to the left of this drop list, you can choose additional account types to use. The accounts will be sorted in name order if the "Enter by name" box is checked.
9. Enter any description you want for the line item in the "Description" field, then fill in the amount for this line item in the amount field. If there is an invoice number you want to use for this line item, fill it in on the "Invoice" field. If this invoice number should be used for multiple lines, click the padlock icon, and this will repeat on the next line item as well. If this invoice number was used on another payment, you will receive a warning if the payment is for the same vendor to help you avoid paying the same payment twice.
10. Click the add button to add this line item to the charge account payment. Repeat steps 8-10 until you have added each line item you need to the charge account payment.
11. If you need to change a line item you've added, click on it, and click the "Edit" button at the bottom of the window. If you need to delete a line item, click on the line item and click the "Delete" button at the bottom of the window.
12. If you have any attachments, such as an image of an invoice for this payment, you can click the Paperclip icon on the right side of the window to bring up the attachments window. There are three slots to enter attachments, click the green plus sign next to one of the slots to search your computer for a file to attach to the check payment. To remove an attachment click the paperclip with the red x in that slot. Click OK when finished.
13. Click the thumbtack icon to add a note to this charge account payment.
14. If you need to add multiple charge account payments at once, make sure the "Add multiple?" box is checked.
15. Click Save to save your charge account payment.

If you need to make changes to a charge account payment after it's been written, you can edit your payment, as long as it has not been voided, or is from a prior fiscal year.

1. On the Payments window, search for the charge account payment that you want to edit.
2. Once you have found the charge account payment, click on it to select it, and then click the "Edit" button at the bottom of the window.
3. The charge account payment window will appear. To edit any line item, click on the line item in question and click "Edit" at the bottom of the window.
4. To delete a line item, click on it, and click "Delete"
5. You can also add any line items through the dark gray area of the window.
6. Click "Save" when finished.

If you need to void or stop a charge account payment use the following procedure:

1. On the Payments window, search for the charge account payment you want to void or stop.
2. Once you have found the charge account payment, click on it to select it, and then click the "Edit" button at the bottom of the window.
3. At the bottom right-hand corner of the charge account payment window, if this payment is from your current fiscal year or later, you will see the void option. Click this option to void the payment. A window will appear to confirm you want to void the payment. Click "Yes" to mark the payment as "Void"
4. You also have the option to stop your charge account payment, by clicking the "Stop" option. A window will appear to confirm you want to stop the payment, and create the corresponding reversing journal entry. Click "Yes" to stop the payment and create the corresponding reversing journal entry.