Effects of the General Ledger application to Lawson Distribution Management
The General Ledger application contains all of the accounts that are used to process distribution transactions. These concepts explain aspects of General Ledger setup that affect the Lawson Distribution Management applications.
Chart of accounts
A chart of accounts is a list of accounts you use to organize accounting records. It is made up of balance sheet accounts (assets, liabilities, and equity) and income statement accounts (income and expenses). The balance sheet and income statement accounts are made up of summary and detail accounts.
Uses of chart of accounts
The chart of accounts is used for journal entries and to summarize general ledger information for reports and inquiries. The account numbers and descriptions you define are reflected in your balance sheets, income statements, and other reports and inquiries. Detail accounts roll up into summary accounts to provide totals.
For more information, see the General Ledger User Guide.
About a General Ledger company
A company is the highest organizational element in the General Ledger application. It can represent any business or legal entity of an organization, such as a corporation, holding company, division, or region.
You can assign a chart of accounts, base operating currency, fiscal calendar, and optional security safeguards to a company.
You can structure your company to match your business needs. Your first decision is whether you will need multiple companies or a single company. You can define up to 9,999 separate companies in General Ledger that you can consolidate for reporting and inquiry.
For more information, see the General Ledger User Guide.
About accounting unit
An accounting unit represents a location or business center in a general ledger company, such as a division, department, region, or store. Each accounting unit must have a unique name, up to 15 characters long.
Your company can include up to five levels of accounting units. A level represents a layer in a company structure's hierarchy. For example, a company structure might include three levels: region, division, and department. Each level is part of or reports to the level above it.
About System control
System control lets you control the way an application (in this case, Order Entry, Warehouse, Billing, and Sales Analysis) interfaces with the General Ledger application. For example, you can require Billing periods to close before closing General Ledger.
System control is set up at the company level in the General Ledger application. For more information, see the General Ledger User Guide.
Planning your General Ledger setup for Lawson Distribution Management
The Lawson General Ledger application is the source for all your organization's financial and reporting information, and is a required product for all Lawson Distribution Management customers.
This checklist provides an overview for setting up General Ledger. For more information, see the General Ledger User Guide.
