The BAL.DAT format, which is ASCII CSV, is used to import Sales & Purchase Ledger Opening Balances to the TAS Sales & Purchase Ledgers. By ‘Opening Balances’ we normally mean individual sales or purchase transactions which have a remaining unpaid (or unallocated) balance at a particular reference date within the business’s financial calendar, usually a month-end or a year-end; these are sometimes also known as ‘open items’. It is most often used when data is being migrated from one system to another (whether or not the originating system is TAS). For example, there may be one or more sales invoices per customer which are wholly unpaid or only part-paid at the reference date; unallocated payments in advance, known as ‘prepayments’, are also treated in the same way.
| Field | Field Label | Data Type | Max Size | Required? | Sample transaction 1 | Sample transaction 2 | Sample transaction 3 | BAL.dat remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Transaction Number | N | 6 | Y | 1 | 2 | 3 | User generated Transaction No, one per transaction, i.e. Invoice/Cr Note or Payment/Receipt |
| 2 | Ledger | A | 2 | Y | SL | SL | PL | SL for Sales Ledger, PL for Purchase Ledger |
| 3 | Transaction Type | A | 1 | N | I | N | I | Transaction Type (optional, but may be used if Description in column 7 is blank) – I=Invoice, N=Credit Note, P=Payment (SL Receipt In, PL Payment Out), R=Refund (SL Paymnt Out, PL Receipt IN), D=Debit Jnl, C=Credit Jnl |
| 4 | Account Code | A | 10 | Y | CUST0001 | CUST0001 | SUPP0001 | Customer or Supplier Code – must exist in relevant TAS Ledger |
| 5 | Doc Ref Number | A | 6 | Y | 100313 | 100591 | 100325 | Document Reference. Invoice/Credit Note Number, Payment Reference (Cheque Num for payments out, Payin Slip Num for receipts in) or Journal Ref |
| 6 | Doc Ref Date | A | 8 | Y | 21/02/2018 | 22/02/2018 | 23/02/2018 | Invoice/Credit/Payment/Journal Ref date. [Future – will be as DD/MM/YY; newer versions support DDMMYYYY (century ignored), DD/MM/YYYY etc] It does not need be the same as the Posting Date, and can be in a different accounting period.] |
| 7 | Description | A | 29 | N | Misc Goods | Misc Credit re BoM | Purchase Invoice | Description; blank defaults to Ledger as ‘SL’ or ‘PL’ + Transaction Type description |
| 8 | NL Account Number | N | 6 | Y | 9999 | 9999 | 9999 | Nominal Account Number to which Opening Balances are posted (by tradition this is 9999). In conjunction with the Nominal Department value (field 9 below) must represent a valid record in the TAS Chart of Accounts. |
| 9 | NL Account Dept | A | 3 | N | 100 | 100 | 100 | Nominal Department. This, in conjunction with the Nominal Account Number value (field 8 above) must represent a valid record in the TAS Chart of Accounts. NB: if this is empty or space-filled (blank) the default Department as set up in TAS, normally ‘100’, is used instead. |
| 10 | Balance Amount | N | 12 | Y | 2587.19 | -305.5 | -141.01 | Balance (outstanding). Amount for the ‘open’ item to 2 d.p., must not = zero, and signed as follows, which determines TAS Posting type: SL Invoices, Debit Journals or Refunds must be + (positive) SL Credit Notes, Credit Journals or Receipts must be – (negative) PL Invoices, Credit Journals or Refunds must be – (negative) PL Credit Notes, Debit Journals or Payments must be + (positive). |
| Carriage Return (Hex = 0D, Dec = 13) | ||||||||
| Line Feed (Hex = 0A, Dec = 10) |