Hi all,
Kmymoney refers to income and expense accounts as categories. I am wondering if anyone else would prefer an option to label income and expense accounts as accounts.
In the USA, accounting wise, this is a more common practice. I am not sure of other places but am curious to hear opinions.
Internally, Categories are treated by KMM as Accounts. The main difference (for the user) is that for Asset and Liability Accounts, you track their balance, as well as the flow in and out of them. For Category Accounts, you don’t the balance is not important, only the amount flowing in or out over some period of time.
Can you be more specific as to where you might want label changes?
I think just in general, instead of referring to them as expense and income categories, let them be expense and income accounts.
I noticed some feedback in reddit and other places where some users switch to other products simply because they use accounts instead of categories.
I have always felt that accounts makes sense from an accounting perspective but categories make sense from a non accounting perspective. I feel kmymoney has a lot to offer but simple little things like this turns some people away. Maybe that’s okay. It is probably a minority.
I know last year or before I opened a discussion or ticket to allow editing transactions from the categories view/ledger. I think that is coming. So happy for that.
This ticket was to discuss if we all think we should know the use of accounts vs categories. Like wise, the use of debut and credit vs charges and payments. Like a flag that can be set by users: standard mode or advanced mode.
Or standard mode vs accounting mode
What do you all think?
More like standard vs accounting terminology, as there is no other change in actions or behavior - just in labels. Unfortunately, no matter what you do, there will always be some who want it to be different. A switch to alter the labels is certainly possible, but I’m personally not sure if it offers more flexibility or more potential confusion.
That’s true. I can agree to that.
And yes the functionality would stay the same. It is just labels and it comes down to preference and target audience. For those that are bookkeepers or accountants, the accounting terms make more sense. At least in the USA. I don’t know what the accounting terms are in other places nor if they differ from what the normal non-accountant types would call them.
That being said, the remaining consideration is who is the target audience. Since kmymoney is targeted at personal finance, maybe it is okay to keep only the non accountant type names.
I know a few users use it for tracking transactions for small companies or non profits. If it works well for them as it is, then maybe we are okay.
I think my biggest concern there is whether or not an accountant would be able to use the reports that kmymoney produces as input to tax or other financial applications.
Yes, I think I see here that KMyMoney is probably targeting Home Users looking for Personal finance.
Small Business Usage
It should be noted that KMyMoney is a personal finance manager, and as such, does not directly support any of the business features of GnuCash, such as tax tables, payroll, and tracking of lots. Any Accounts Payable or Receivable accounts found in a file will be imported as Liability or Asset accounts respectively.
I am guessing that Accounts, Debits, Credits, etc are more business finance terms than personal finance terms. I personally like the finance terms more even for my personal finances. I like to manage my personal finance as a business. It may just be me though. I love kMyMoney and only bring this up in case others feel the same way and to gauge if there is any interest in requesting something in this direction. I do agree with the idea that no solution will make everyone happy, there will always be someone that comes up with a new idea.
Anyways, let’s see if anyone else would like this ability or if no one else cares for it, at least we would know.