Changing general ledger account structures

You can change the default component values for general ledger accounts to be specific to organizations within your enterprise. You might want organizations to have distinct general ledger account structures. For example, the lengths of the components might vary, and the components might be of different data types, depending on how the components are being used.

About this task

The first time the Add/Modify Account Structure window displays, the default configuration defined for the general ledger account displays. You use the Database Configuration application to define the default configuration at the system level. The changes made to organization-specific account structures do not affect the configuration specified at the system level.

You can define one account structure specific to each organization. When the account structure is defined, you can modify the attributes. The modified account structure does not affect existing data.

Procedure

  1. In the Chart of Accounts application, select the organization for which you want to modify the general ledger account structure.
  2. Select the Add/Modify Account Structure action.
  3. In the Add/Modify Account Structure window, select the component for which you want to modify values.
  4. In the Component field, specify the name of the component.
  5. In the Length field, specify the length of the field. The length of the field cannot exceed the length defined at the system level.
  6. In the Type field, specify the data type for the component. If the type defined at the system level is numeric, the type set at the organization level cannot be alphanumeric. If the type set at the system level is alphanumeric, the type set at the organization level can be numeric.
  7. Optional: Click the Required check box if you want the component to be mandatory. If the value set at the system level is 1, the Required check box is read-only. If the value set at the system level is 0, this check box is modifiable for the organization.
  8. Optional: Modify the Screen Delimiter to specify a different separator character between components.
  9. Click OK.

Example

For example, you can create account structures for different organizations in separate geographic regions, as follows:
  • Organization A is in Europe. Organization A has the account structure xxx-xx-xxx with component one and component two being required. Component two is of the alphanumeric type.
  • Organization B is in North America. Organization B has the account structure xxx-xxx-xx with components one, two, and three being required. Component two is of the integer data type.