[Opinion] Date vs Period options per entry type in Pastel Partner and Pastel Xpress

[Alec Candiotes]

Pastel Xpress and #Pastel Partner are still the two most commonly used accounting systems, by SME's in SA.

I work extensively with multiple Pastel databases. These databases are soundly structured based on T-account principles. As a CA, I am impressed with the depth and accuracy of it.

The overall posting principles are guided by the way your Pastel has been configured. Mostly these configurations are seen in your Setup tab.

Working with Pastel data, I have come across some common practices that are often overlooked. One of these are the default period settings. These can be found in Setup > Entry Types.

There are two options per Entry Type:
1) Date Sets Period
2) Period Defaults Date

Pastel defaults to option 2. With this option Pastel disregards the date you enter, but takes the period entered as the processing principle. For instance, if you post a cash book transaction with a date of 01/03/2030 accidentally, but select period 1 of your 2020 financial year, it will post to period 1 of 2020 and will report this way. This causes major confusion later, especially when your auditors look at it.

I recommend to select option 1 (Date Sets Period) which will help you eliminate this anomaly.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this matter.

All the best!
Alec Candiotes CA(SA), MCom Taxation

[AnnieA]

Hi Alec,

The ability to change the date (by accident) regardless of the period you selected has caused massive confusion in many a VAT recon as well. Transactions that are accidentally backdated based on the period will automatically change your VAT control brought forward balance. The effect on transactions effectively post dated by the incorrect period will cause havoc as well. Pastel Evolution has the option to open and close periods which enables stricter control over transactions processed. if the period is not open to process in, the system will not allow the transaction to be processed or updated. Pastel Partner however does not have this option. it opens and closes Tax Periods, but does not prevent this type of error. It would be very helpful if Pastel Partner adds the blocking of periods to its features

[Neville Bailey]

Hi Alec,

The ability to change the date (by accident) regardless of the period you selected has caused massive confusion in many a VAT recon as well. Transactions that are accidentally backdated based on the period will automatically change your VAT control brought forward balance. The effect on transactions effectively post dated by the incorrect period will cause havoc as well. Pastel Evolution has the option to open and close periods which enables stricter control over transactions processed. if the period is not open to process in, the system will not allow the transaction to be processed or updated. Pastel Partner however does not have this option. it opens and closes Tax Periods, but does not prevent this type of error. It would be very helpful if Pastel Partner adds the blocking of periods to its features

In fact, there is an option in Pastel Xpress and Pastel Partner to restrict certain or all users (other than Supervisor users) to process in a particular period only.

To activate this control, edit each user's processing options (under Setup...Users/Passwords...Users) and deselect Multi Period Processing under the General Ledger section.

Then, as the Supervisor, go to Setup...Periods and define the current processing period number in the Current Period field.

[Alec Candiotes]

Thanks AnnieA for the comment and your insight. I agree with you that the date and period that differ can really cause massive confusion and havoc.

Thanks Neville for sharing another way to stop multi-period posting. That is a great feature. So does this option restrict a user to only process transaction in the current month as per your calendar?

AnnieA I have advised many of our customers who have been using Pastel for many years to change their E-type processing settings as I explained above. I have not had one customer that has come back with a negative experience once they switched over. It is a great additional control. I am definitely going to test Neville's suggestion above on top of my method. I think that this may add an additional level of control that Pastel users would want to know off.

Kindest regards,
Alec

[Neville Bailey]

Thanks Neville for sharing another way to stop multi-period posting. That is a great feature. So does this option restrict a user to only process transaction in the current month as per your calendar?

The user is restricted to processing in the period number field in the Setup...Periods screen, on the left side.

[Alec Candiotes]

Thank you Neville. I will try it out and give feedback.

[Alec Candiotes]

Hi Neville, we have created a demo Pastel company for testing and customer training. I just tried out the restriction of Multi-Period processing and it works so well. Thank you Neville. This is really a great additional control to put in place to ensure that capturing is done in the same period and is done on time.

Attached is the period screen where you set which period is open for processing as Neville indicated. It took me some time to find (my eye just kept scanned right past it).