Depreciation settings

This screen configures depreciation: which books you keep, how your accountant groups the fleet, how each group depreciates, and which ledger accounts each posting lands in. Open it from Administration → Depreciation. It is usually set up once by a controller and then left alone for a year.

If you don’t see this in your navigation, your administrator can switch the module on under Administration → Modules, or it may not be included in your plan.

The stat strip counts books, classes, policies and periods. The longer lists — asset classes, class defaults, policies, policy rules, ledger accounts and posting rules — each have a search box and Filter to narrow them by any column. The sections run in the order you set them up:

Section	What it holds
Set up from a country pack	A ready-made arrangement for a company’s country, offered only before any book exists
Accounting books	One set of answers about the whole fleet — the accounts book, the tax book
Fiscal Calendars	A pointer to the calendar screen
Asset classes	How your accountant groups the fleet
Class defaults	Which class an asset starts in, read from its category
Rate tables	Published percentage schedules such as MACRS
Depreciation policies	A method, a life or rate, a residual and a first-period convention
Policy rules	Which policy each class follows in each book, from a date
Ledger accounts	The account codes a journal carries
Posting rules	Which accounts each book debits and credits
Opening balances	Where a book starts, pasted from your previous system

Warnings appear at the top when a book cannot run yet — a book with no policy rule (every run excepts the whole book), a class with no posting rule (the post refuses at the handover), or a calendar with no periods generated. Who can change this. Books, policy rules and posting rules need Add depreciation books, fiscal calendars and rules and Configure depreciation books, calendars and rules. Classes, class defaults, rate tables and policies need Add asset classes and depreciation policies and Edit asset classes and depreciation policies. Ledger accounts need Add accounts depreciation posts to and Edit accounts depreciation posts to. Without View depreciation books, calendars and their rules, the screen says the books are set up by finance and shows nothing else.

Country packs

A country publishes most of what this screen is made of: when its financial year opens, which books a company there keeps, how its statutes group the fleet, and what each group attracts. Set up from a country pack installs all of that for one company in one step, and leaves you the two things it cannot know — your ledger accounts and the assets themselves. The section appears only for a company that has no book yet, with the packs matching its country. Packs for Other countries are reachable too, because a company incorporated in one country and filing in another is normal. Open a pack to see What this pack creates — each policy says what it will do, so it can be checked against the statute — and Install it. The result lists what was created, what it deliberately did not do, and anything still needed. Classes and policies already present under the same codes are left exactly as they are, including your edits.

The India pack sets up books under Companies Act 2013 Schedule II and the Income-tax Act block of assets. See India for the India-specific settings.

Accounting books

One book is one set of answers about the whole fleet. Most manufacturers run two — the book that goes into the accounts and the tax book that computes a deduction — off one calendar, and they disagree about every figure in every month.

Column	What it shows
Code and Name	How the book is identified
Purpose	statutory, tax, management and so on, with primary on the company’s primary book
Framework	The statute or standard it follows
Company, Currency, Calendar	Whose book it is, what it counts in and which periods it runs in
Rules	How many policy rules it has
Journal	Whether posting rules are mapped, part mapped or not mapped
Active	Yes or No

Add opens the form; click a book to edit it. The bin at the end of a book’s row deletes it, for people allowed to delete books. A book can be deleted only while nothing uses it — no asset, run, journal or opening balance is in it. Where something does, the bin is greyed and pressing it says why; turn the book’s Active off instead. Deleting asks you to confirm, and Delete it takes the book’s policy rules and posting rules with it. It cannot be brought back here; if it is needed after all, add it again. Its calendar can then be deleted too, if nothing else uses it. Where deleting needs approval in your organisation, the screen says Deleting this book needs approval. Nothing has been changed yet.

Field	What it means	Notes
Code	What a spreadsheet import matches on	Made from the name if left empty. Unique in your organisation
Name	What finance calls it — “Companies Act”, “Income Tax”, “US GAAP”	Required
Purpose	Why the book exists: Statutory, Tax, Management, IFRS or Insurance	Defaults to Statutory. A statutory book goes into the annual accounts; a tax book computes a deduction
Framework	The statute or standard, in your own words	Shown on the book; nothing is computed from it
Installed from pack	The country pack the book came from	Filled in by a pack install
Company	The legal entity the book belongs to	Required. Fixed once the book exists
Fiscal Calendar	Which calendar’s periods the book is run and closed in	Required. Fixed once the book exists. Calendars come from fiscal calendars. A calendar is one financial year; the book runs on into next year’s calendar when that one names this one under Continues
Currency	The currency every figure in the book is in	Required. Fixed once the book exists; take the company’s own
Basis	per asset — every asset carries its own schedule	Pooled depreciation is not available yet
Rounding scale	How many decimal places a charge is rounded to	2 for most currencies, 0 where the smallest unit is the whole one
Primary book	The book an asset’s carrying amount is shown from when no book is chosen	One per company
Active	Whether the book runs

Fiscal calendars

The year a book counts in is set up under Fiscal Calendar, because a budget head and a capex plan are opened for the same year. Fiscal Calendar in this section goes there. A calendar with no periods is named in the warnings at the top, and a book on it can be created but not run.

Asset classes

How your accountant groups the fleet — a MACRS property class, a Schedule II class, an Income Tax block. It is deliberately a separate list from the engineering asset categories. The list shows Code, Name, What belongs in it and Active; drag a row to reorder. Rows cannot be dragged while the list is searched.

Field	What it means	Notes
Code	What an import matches on	Made from the name if empty
Name	The name your accountant uses — “Plant and machinery”, “Computers”	Required
Description	Which assets belong here, in words somebody classifying one would need
Active	Whether the class is offered

Class defaults

Which class an asset starts in when nobody says otherwise, read from the category it is filed under. A mapping covers everything nested beneath its category, and a mapping deeper in that branch overrides it. It is only a starting answer: the class on an asset always wins, and changing a mapping never touches an asset already depreciating. Without one, an asset capitalised without a class falls to the book’s default rule.

Field	What it means	Notes
Category	The asset category this default reads from	Required. Covers everything nested under it
Asset class	The class an asset in that category starts in	Required

Rate tables

The schedules a legislature publishes as percentages per year rather than as a formula. A policy using one has no convention applied on top, because the table already includes it.

List	What it shows
This tenant’s copies	Tables installed for you: Name, Authority, Years, Sums to, Convention, Used by (policies) and From (the shipped table it was copied from)
Shipped with the product	Tables you can install: Where, Schedule, Authority, Years, What it covers, and Install or installed

Hide other countries narrows the shipped list to your companies’ countries.

Depreciation policies

A method, a life or a rate, what is left at the end, and how the first period is charged. A policy belongs to no book — a rule maps it to one — so the same policy can serve several books.

Column	What it shows
Name	The policy
Method	straight line, written-down value, published table or what the machine does
Over	The life in months, or the total expected units
Extra shift	Whether extra shift depreciation applies
Residual	The residual percentage
First period	The first-period convention, in words
Switches	to straight line where it switches
Active	Yes or No

Field	What it means	Notes
Name	What the rule set is called — “Schedule II · Plant 15y SLM”	Required
Method	straight line, declining balance (written-down value), rate table or units of production	Defaults to straight line. Decides which fields below are needed
Useful life (months)	How long the asset lasts — 180 for fifteen years	Required for straight line; ignored by written-down value unless a factor is used
Annual rate (%)	The rate applied each year to the carrying amount	Required for declining balance unless a factor is given
Declining factor	2 for 200% declining balance, 1.5 for 150%	The rate becomes the factor divided by the life in years
Switch to straight line	Charges whichever of declining balance and straight line over what is left is larger	On for MACRS; off for India’s written-down value, which never switches
Rate table	The published schedule to read each year’s percentage from	Required for the rate table method
Measured by	The meter that drives the charge — running hours, cycles, distance	Required for units of production. Readings come from the meters maintenance already reads
Total expected units	How much work the asset is expected to do over its life	Required for units of production
Extra shift depreciation	Raises depreciation by half for double shift and doubles it for triple shift	Schedule II Part C. The shift is worked out from the asset’s own hour meter against the site’s working week
Residual (%)	The proportion of cost left at the end	Schedule II normally caps it at 5. Use this or Residual amount, not both
Residual amount	A fixed floor instead of a proportion	In the book’s currency
Write off below	An asset costing less than this is charged in full in its first period	Leave empty for no threshold
First period convention	How the period an asset goes into service is charged	Options include Full period, Actual days, Next period, Half period, Mid-month, Half-year, Mid-quarter and India’s 180-day rule. Defaults to Full period
Period basis	How a year’s charge is split: equal periods or actual days	Defaults to equal periods
Active	Whether the policy can be used

Policy rules

Which policy a class follows in a book. Leave the class empty for the book’s default rule, which catches every asset no other rule names. A rule takes effect from its start date forward; periods already run against an earlier rule are not recalculated. The list shows Book, Class (or the book’s default), Policy, From and Until (or in force).

Field	What it means	Notes
Asset class	The class the rule covers	Empty means every class the book has no other rule for
Depreciation policy	The policy to apply	Required
Effective from	The date the rule starts	Required
Effective to	The date it stops	Leave empty while it is the current rule

Ledger accounts

The codes a journal will carry, exactly as your ledger has them. A book needs at least a depreciation expense account and an accumulated depreciation account before it can hand anything over. The list shows Code, Name, For and Active.

Field	What it means	Notes
Code	The account code exactly as your ledger has it
Name	The account name	Required
Company	Whose ledger the account is in	Required
Account type	Expense, Accumulated depreciation, Asset, Clearing or Gain or loss	Defaults to Expense
Active	Whether it can be mapped

Posting rules

Which accounts each book debits and credits. One rule with no class is usually all a book needs. A class with no rule stops the whole journal rather than being left out of it. The list shows Book, Class, Debit, Credit and On disposal.

Field	What it means	Notes
Asset class	The class the rule covers	Empty for the book’s default mapping
Depreciation expense	Debited each period	Required
Accumulated depreciation	Credited each period	Required
Asset cost	Credited when an asset leaves, to take its cost off the balance sheet	Only needed once something is disposed
Proceeds	Debited with what was received	A clearing account is the usual answer
Gain or loss on disposal	Where the difference lands

A sale is recorded whether or not the disposal accounts are set; until they are, the disposal register says its money has not reached a journal.

Opening balances

Where a book starts, for assets you bring over from a previous system. Choose the Book, then Paste a file: copy the rows out of your spreadsheet and paste them into The rows. The columns, in order, are asset number, in-service date, cost, depreciation already charged, asset class code, currency code, useful life in months and reference. A header row is recognised, so another order works when named. Dates are YYYY-MM-DD, and only the asset number, the date and the cost are required. Check the lines writes nothing: every line is checked against the asset numbers, classes, policy rules and exchange rates, and lines that cannot be placed are named before you decide.

Setting up

Configuration

Country packs

Accounting books

Fiscal calendars

Asset classes

Class defaults

Rate tables

Depreciation policies

Policy rules

Ledger accounts

Posting rules

Opening balances