Opening Balances

A business that has traded before MahirRMS doesn't start from zero — it starts from a cut-over date with the balances it genuinely has: cash, bank, stock, what customers owe, what suppliers are owed.

The cut-over#

Pick a clean date — the start of a month, ideally of a financial year. As of that date, capture from the old system (or the accountant's records):

• Trial balance — every account's balance, which becomes the opening entry.
• Party detail — the per-customer and per-supplier breakdowns behind the receivable/payable totals, so old dues are collectible by name.
• Stock on hand — counted physically, valued, entered as opening inventory. A stock reconciliation-grade count at cut-over is the best first gift you can give your food-cost reports.
• Un-cleared instruments — cheques issued or received that haven't cleared, so the first bank reconciliation isn't fighting ghosts.

How it's done#

Opening balances are entered with support as part of onboarding — a balanced opening entry against the standard opening-balance equity account, verified against your old trial balance before go-live. The test that it worked: your accountant runs the first trial balance and recognizes every number.

Two honest warnings#

• Garbage in, permanent garbage. An opening balance nobody verified becomes a discrepancy someone chases for years. Verify at cut-over, when the old system is still open to check against.
• Don't back-fill history. The temptation to re-enter last year's transactions "for completeness" produces months of work and a ledger that agrees with nothing. Open with balances; keep history in the old system's archive.