Ghost in the machine - A/Pay

[JohnnyC44]

The newbie again! Thank God for this forum.

I just discovered that April (a closed month) is out of balance on the G/L -- in many accounts. The culprit is a check paid to AMEX. When I call up the payment screen from the check register I see the full amount of the check posted to the "Apply to Invoices" tab AND the "Apply to Expenses" tab is a corresponding zero.

However, when I click on the Journal button in the menu bar I see the full entry spreading this payment by 50+ expense categories. These amounts then show and print in the G/L, but do not foot in the G/L, i.e., are not included in the activity for the month, as if they didn't really post -- hence my reference to ghosts.

As I said earlier: April is closed, and bank recs are done, and I have no idea how this arose in the first place. My predecessor was here a little more than two months before she left and then there was a short hiatus until I came on board.

What is the easiest way to fix this? My first inclination is to zero the "Apply to Invoices" tab and re-key the expenses in the "Apply to Expenses" tab, but I'm afraid that will just double up on the problem -- unless there is a way to clear the ghost transactions.

I know that Verify Data and Run the Integrity Check are options to explore, but the Help warnings and references to contacting PT support to hold my hand put these in the last resort category.

Thanks again for your time and help....

Cordially,

John

[Jim Dale]

Run a Data Verification if you have 2003 or newer. It automatically creates both a backup and an error log. You can restore your backup if the results are not good

[Shannon Tucker]

If it turns out your data is damaged and restoring a backup would mean too much reentry, your existing data could be repaired. (http://peachtreeusers.com/datarepair.htm)

[JohnnyC44]

Thank you, Jim. I waited until the weekend to run the data verification check -- after payroll.

Every thing seems to be working fine. I no longer get the out-of-balance/footing error messages.

But I did get some funky error messages on the data verification: "A CDJ transaction dated X/X/XX with reference [check number] for $XX.XX refers to an invalid account record number [#XXXXXXX]. The account was changed. The Chart/Journal synch test was started...."

I got this message for every single nonpayroll check I've cut since I've been here -- 420 of them. Here's how I run vendor payables, so what am I doing wrong now?

We are cash basis. I use A/Pay to keep track of payables on a memo basis. A bill comes in and I post it immediately, making certain the appropriate expense account is charged.

Then I select for payment and pay the bill. Everything seems fine. When I click on a check to review it I see the "Apply to Invoices" tab with activity, but the actual journal entry is to the expense account class.

It's this that PT's verification is squawking about -- I think.

John, still a newbie

[Jim Dale]

It may have been sonething that was unrelated to the procedure you use. I like data verification because it creates the datalog.txt, and because it appears to work. Run it again after this week and see if it gives those errors again. If not, you must not be doing anything wrong.