Accounts

B&B Manager allows you to set up accounts against which to record all your payments at expenses. At the end of your accounting periods, or at any other time, you can generate an account statement showing your turnover, expenses and profits to date. This is important for making financial forecasts, and in submitting your year-end accounts, which are a legal requirement for all businesses.

Viewing & Adding Accounts

You can view your account list by clicking on the Accounts button in the toolbar, or by selecting Accounts > View Accounts from the top menu. To add a new account, click on the Add button at the top of the Accounts screen and set the name of the account (e.g. "2007/08 Accounts"), a description of the account, and the account start and end periods. Typically, each account would run for one year (e.g. 1st January to 31st December) but B&B Manager does not impose this restriction. You can set up as many accounts as you like even if these run concurrently. This may be useful, for example, if you wish to manage both rooms and self-catering apartments within B&B Manager but using different accounts.

Removing an Account

To remove an account, click on the account in the Accounts screen and click on the Remove button. If the button is disabled, it means that the account already has bookings and/or expenses assigned to it and cannot be removed.

Assigning Bookings to an Account

When you add a booking using the New Booking screen, you are required to set the account to which the booking should be assigned. By default, B&B Manager selects the first account it finds whose dates include the dates of the booking, but you are free to override this. To change the account to which an existing booking is assigned, double-click the booking in the Room Information panel to display the Booking Details form, then select the account from the list at the bottom of the screen.

Assigning Expenses to an Account

When you add a new expense, you are required to set the account to which the expense should be assigned. By default, B&B Manager selects the first account it finds whose dates include the date of the expense, but you are free to choose a different account if you need to. To change the account to which an existing expense is assigned, click on the Expenses button in the toolbar to view the Expenses screen, double-click the required expense to view the details, and select the required account from the drop-down list.

Viewing Account Summaries & Generating Reports

B&B Manager can generate account statements to assist with your interim and end of year accounting. To view an account summary, click on the Accounts button in the toolbar to view the Accounts screen, then click on the required account to highlight it and press the Account Summary button. The Account Summary screen shows the following details for the account:

Value of Bookings. This is the total value of all bookings currently assigned to the account, including those that are in the future.
Turnover. This is the total amount of payments received for bookings assigned to the account.
Expenses. This is the total amount of expenses assigned to the account.
Profit. This is calculated as the turnover minus the expenses

There are two settings that you can use to affect these totals. Firstly, If you are VAT registered, unticking the Include VAT setting automatically removes the VAT element from the totals. For those of who you record VAT against bookings and expenses, this will lower the totals. Secondly, you can tick the box marked Show expenses up to today only to calculate expense totals based on the current date. This will lower the value of the periodic (i.e. daily, weekly, monthly, annual and PPPN) expenses so that rather than calculating the total for the year, the total is calculated pro rata based on the current date.

For a more detailed breakdown of the account, click on the Show Interim Period button at the top of the screen. This displays the value of bookings, turnover, expenses and profit figures for each month in which the account is operational, including before the start date of the account (for deposits taken in advance of bookings within the accounting period) and after the end date of the account (for payments received late on bookings within the accounting period). You can alter this breakdown to show quarterly rather than monthly figures by selecting "Quarterly" from the Interim Period drop-down and clicking again on the Show Interim Periods button.

When the time comes to present your books to your accountant, or at any other time, you can print the account summary by clicking on the Report button. The account summary is then generated in Adobe PDF format showing the details of each booking and expense in the account. The final page of the report shows the total turnover, expenses and profit, which are the key figures your accountant will use to calculate your tax liability.

View Deposits

If you regularly take deposits ahead of bookings, you may need to find out the total amount you are holding in deposit, as this cannot be counted as turnover until the bookings have been fulfilled. You can view the total deposits held at a specific date by selecting Accounts > Deposits Held and selecting the date. Once a booking has started, the deposit assigned to that booking are removed from the list of deposits held.

Setting VAT Rates

For those of you who are VAT registered, B&B Manager provides a comprehensive facility for managing your VAT rates, applying different rates to your bookings and facilities, and estimating your VAT liability. Before you can apply VAT to bookings, click on the Hotel button on the toolbar to view your Guest House details, then click on the Payment Details tab at the top of the screen and ensure that the VAT Registered box is ticked.

You can then set up the different VAT rates you will require by selecting Accounts > View VAT Rates from the top menu. B&B Manager provides the most commonly used UK VAT rates by default, but you can add a new VAT rate by clicking on the Add button and entering the new rate details. You can remove a VAT rate by clicking on the rate to highlight it and clicking the Remove button.

Now when you add a new booking, you can choose the VAT rate for the booking from the list of available VAT rates shown in the VAT rate list near the bottom of the screen. You can update the VAT rate(s) applied to room and facility bookings within a booking by double-clicking the booking in the Room Information panel, then double-clicking the facility and/or room bookings and setting the VAT rate.

Applying VAT to Expenses

As well as the VAT you collect, you should record the VAT you pay on your expenses. You can do this by setting the VAT rate when you add a new expense, or by editing an existing expense in the Expenses screen and setting the VAT rate.

Generating VAT Reports

You can view VAT reports for any number of months by selecting Accounts > New VAT Report from the top menu. Select the start month and the number of months you want to view, along with the amount of any VAT you are carrying over from a previous period. The VAT report is generated in PDF format and displayed in Adobe Acrobat, which is a freely available piece of software that you can download from the Adobe website if you don't already have it installed. The report shows the total VAT collected on sales and paid on expenses for each individual VAT rate for each month specified. The total VAT collected and paid is shown at the end of the report.

You can view previously generated VAT reports by selecting Accounts > View VAT Reports from the top menu. Double-click on any VAT report in the list to view the contents.