Chart of accounts: system accounts, sub-accounts and archiving
Every company starts with the Costa Rica Spanish chart of accounts. You can add sub-accounts and archive the ones you do not use; system accounts and accounts with history are never deleted.
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Steps
Open Accounting → Ledger: the tree on the left is the chart of accounts. When the company was created, Tario loaded the Costa Rica catalog (Efectivo y Equivalentes de Efectivo, Cuentas por Cobrar, IVA Crédito Fiscal, Inventario, Impuestos sobre Ventas, Costo de Ventas…) grouped into Asset, Liability, Equity, Revenue and Expense.
Use Search accounts… to find an account by name or code and click it to see its activity (debits, credits and balance).
To add an account click New account and fill in Category, Code, Name, Nature and Currency. Pick a Parent account to create it as a sub-account; it must share the parent's category and type.
Under Behavior decide whether it Allows journal entries (turn it off for headings and grouping accounts), whether it is a Default account, the Allowed source (any source, manual only, documents, banking, inventory…) and the Effective from and Effective until dates.
System accounts (Cuentas por Cobrar, Cuentas por Pagar, IVA Débito Fiscal, IVA Crédito Fiscal, Inventario, Costo de Ventas, Caja, Utilidades Retenidas, Resultado del Período, among others) are used by the posting engine by purpose: you can rename them, but you cannot change their classification, archive them or turn off Allows journal entries.
To retire an account you no longer use, edit it and turn off Visible in selectors: it becomes archived, leaves the selectors and receives no new entries, but keeps its history. In the tree you can see it with Show archived.
Accounts are not deleted: every balance or historical movement must remain traceable. If you created one by mistake, archive it.
Tips
- Reports and returns are built from each system account's purpose, not its name; renaming one breaks nothing.
- If you want a product or expense to use its own account, create it as a sub-account and assign it on the product (Income / Expense column) so documents pick it up automatically.
Common errors
| Code or message | What it means | How to fix it |
|---|---|---|
A system account cannot be archived. | You tried to turn off Visible in selectors on an account the posting engine needs. | Keep it visible; if you want to organize the detail, create sub-accounts for day-to-day use. |
The parent account must have the same category and type. | You chose a parent from another category or nature. | Choose a Parent account with the same Category and Nature, or leave the field empty to create a root account. |
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