Working with foreign currency

Applies to : Office Accounting Express, Professional

Enabling foreign currency in Office Accounting Professional will add a Foreign Currency menu on the Company menu.

Foreign Currency menu

Currency List

The currency list displays all the foreign currencies that have been set up in Office Accounting Professional.

Currency List

The currency list allows you to add, edit and delete currencies as well as removing unused currencies. Currencies that have been referenced by a customer, supplier, bank account or transaction cannot be removed (but they can be made Inactive).

The Add or Edit Currency dialog can be opened by selecting a currency and pressing Edit.

Add or Edit Currency dialog

Office Accounting allows you to define a currency symbol and currency code for each currency as well as maintaining historical exchange rates. The exchange gain and exchange loss accounts are the nominal accounts where gains and losses for the individual currency are posted. By default Office Accounting sets up one account for all gains and one account for all losses.

Tip :         Windows has a Character Map tool on the Accessories, System Tools menu that can be used for looking up symbols for foreign currencies, such as ¥.


Exchange Rates

As mentioned above, Office Accounting keeps track of historical exchange rates for each currency. This helps you if you are recording transactions back in time.

You can update the exchange rates for all the active foreign currencies by selecting Update Exchange Rate in the Foreign Currency menu.

Exchange Rate Update dialog

The advantage of this dialog is that you can set the exchange rates for all active currencies at once without having to go through the currency dialog for each currency.

Foreign exchange rates are quoted in foreign units per Sterling. In the example above the exchange rate is set for Euros, American, Australian and Canadian dollars.

When you create documents in foreign currency, Office Accounting will automatically use the last effective exchange rate on or before the document date. However you can change the exchange rate on a document if the one you have provided is invalid for whatever reason.

Tip : You can save the URL of your favourite online source for exchange rates in the Currency web page address field and use the browse button to get to the exchange rates web sites for quick reference when you are updating the exchange rates.

Master Records with Foreign Currency

Office Accounting Professional supports customers, suppliers, bank- and credit card accounts in foreign currency.

Foreign currency customer

This is how it works:

  • When foreign currency is enabled, you have to select a currency for the customer, supplier or bank/credit card account
  • A master record can only have one currency.
  • The default currency is Pound Sterling.
  • Balances of foreign currency master records will be displayed in foreign currency as well as in Sterling.
  • The title of the form will display the currency code (here CAD) in parenthesis to call out it is a foreign currency record.
  • All documents must be in the customer’s (or supplier’s / bank account’s) currency.
  • Once a document has been created, the currency of the master record cannot be changed.
  • For customers and suppliers, the financial summary and financial history will be displayed in both foreign currency and Sterling.

Financial summary for a foreign currency customer

Lists with Foreign Currency

After you have enabled foreign currency, basically all lists in Office Accounting Professional will display the currency of the transaction, the amount is foreign currency as well as the corresponding amount in Sterling.

Quote List with foreign currency enabled

Displaying the currency as well as the amounts in both foreign currency and Sterling makes it easier to sort the lists to find what you are looking for.

Tip : Because Office Accounting Professional adds two extra columns to all the lists (currency and amount in Sterling) when foreign currency is enabled, you may want to remove or rearrange some columns to keep the lists simple.


Documents with Foreign Currency

When you have set up foreign currency customers, suppliers or bank and credit card accounts, you can create documents with transactions in foreign currency.

Sample foreign currency invoice

This is how it works:

  • Open up the document type you want to create and pick the foreign currency customer or supplier.
  • The currency exchange rate will be looked up based on the date of the documents, but may be changed.
  • Select the products and services for the customer or supplier and the corresponding unit price will be calculated based on the exchange rate.
  • Office Accounting will calculate the total in foreign currency as well as in Sterling based on the exchange rate.
  • Click Save and Close to save the transaction.
  • The document will be posted in foreign currency as well as in Sterling. This way your financial records will always appear in Sterling even though some of your transactions are in foreign currency.