To use retainers, you must enable retainers and set up a retainer account for each accounts receivable category your company uses.
While retainers are sometimes treated as accounts receivable, it is a good practice to set up retainer accounts as liability (2xx.xx) accounts, to conform with generally accepted accounting principles.
To enable and set up the Retainer feature:
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In the Navigation pane, select
.
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On the Options form, set the
Use Retainers option to
Yes.
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Click
Save.
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On the Navigation pane, select
.
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On the Accounts form, add a retainer account for each accounts receivable account in your chart of accounts.
If you use only one accounts receivable account, add only one retainer account.
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In the Invoice Mapping Accounts section of the Accounts Receivable settings form in
, map the retainer accounts to accounts receivable accounts:
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In the
Invoice Account field, enter the number of the new retainer account. If you use only one retainer account, enter it in this field and leave the other fields blank.
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In the
AR Account field, enter the accounts receivable account.
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In the
AR Column field, select the column in which the retainer offset is displayed on the Accounts Receivable Ledger report. Leave the other two columns blank.
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Click
Save.