I'm not sure if this is a bug or user error, but it seems to be unexpected behaviour.

I have an investment loan, that I pay monthly interest only on. The funds for this payment is automatically transferred from account A (a current account in skrooge) to the loan account (marked as a loan account in skrooge).
The debit from the current account and the credit to the loan account occur on different days (presumably due to the banks internal processes), so I have to manually link the transactions with the "group operations" function so that it appears as a transfer to skrooge.

I have tagged the transfer transaction with a specific category. I have also gone on to tag the interest debit from the loan account (which the bank withdraws) with the same category.

When I review the monthly report, this category comes up in the top 5 expenditure categories, but the amount displayed is exactly double the amount I have actually paid for the month. It appears that skrooge is double counting the transaction for some reason. If I'm not using skrooge correctly by tagging the entire transaction with the same category, then is there another way I should be doing it?

MoLE wrote:I'm not sure if this is a bug or user error, but it seems to be unexpected behaviour.

First, what is your version of Skrooge? 1.5.1?

MoLE wrote:
I have an investment loan, that I pay monthly interest only on. The funds for this payment is automatically transferred from account A (a current account in skrooge) to the loan account (marked as a loan account in skrooge).
The debit from the current account and the credit to the loan account occur on different days (presumably due to the banks internal processes), so I have to manually link the transactions with the "group operations" function so that it appears as a transfer to skrooge.

In fact, a transfer to a loan account is not considered as a transfer. You should have a icon with a double arrow with a red minus.
It means that this is a group but not a transfer.

MoLE wrote:
I have tagged the transfer transaction with a specific category. I have also gone on to tag the interest debit from the loan account (which the bank withdraws) with the same category.

When I review the monthly report, this category comes up in the top 5 expenditure categories, but the amount displayed is exactly double the amount I have actually paid for the month. It appears that skrooge is double counting the transaction for some reason. If I'm not using skrooge correctly by tagging the entire transaction with the same category, then is there another way I should be doing it?

I am not able to reproduce the issue.
Here is the file used to reproduce it.
http://dl.free.fr/rm.pl?h=gl0mwhnPZ&i=55207718&s=xJPoiXHGkOK5zf2sRwxz0eF6iHFeQ4MF
Could you provide me a simple sample with the bug reproduced?

Thank you for using Skrooge and for your help.
Regards.

<quote>

When I review the monthly report, this category comes up in the top 5 expenditure categories, but the amount displayed is exactly double the amount I have actually paid for the month. It appears that skrooge is double counting the transaction for some reason. If I'm not using skrooge correctly by tagging the entire transaction with the same category, then is there another way I should be doing it?

</quote> Forum doesn't like <> tags. I'll just leave them for decoration.

Since Skrooge doesn't really like transfers between current accounts and loans (red minus appears overlaid on transfer icon to tell me I'm doing it wrong), the easiest way I've found to prevent double-counting, as well as problems with budgeting loan payments and in reporting is to keep all the loans in a separate .skg file.

This way a car payment, e.g., can appear in the budget as a payment and also doesn't show up as income on the monthly report. If I keep the car loan in the same .skg, then the car payment is a payment from the bank and a payment into the loan. Technically, this is true, since I've just shifted money from one to the other and decreased the liability of the loan by the same amount that was moved from checking. So in the same .skg file, I've got a credit and debit for the car payment, and appears as a zero in the budget. Assets and liabilities are accurate, but budget is off. This also fixes the problem of the credit into the car loan appearing as "income" in monthly report.

With a separate account for the loans, a car payment is simply a debit from checking. Budget shows I'm on track for the month for auto expenses. Disadvantage of this approach is that I can't automatically reconcile payments to the loan in the bank account with payments in the loan account, but since I'm reconciling both accounts vs. what the banks say, so it's workable. It's not as big a hassle as it sounds, really.

I suspect that this might be a good approach to the margin account problem your having, too. You will have to compute net worth externally . .

rbruce wrote:<quote>

When I review the monthly report, this category comes up in the top 5 expenditure categories, but the amount displayed is exactly double the amount I have actually paid for the month. It appears that skrooge is double counting the transaction for some reason. If I'm not using skrooge correctly by tagging the entire transaction with the same category, then is there another way I should be doing it?

</quote> Forum doesn't like <> tags. I'll just leave them for decoration.

Since Skrooge doesn't really like transfers between current accounts and loans (red minus appears overlaid on transfer icon to tell me I'm doing it wrong),

Hi,
The red minus does not mean "wrong". I think I will change the icon for a new one meaning "group".

rbruce wrote:the easiest way I've found to prevent double-counting, as well as problems with budgeting loan payments and in reporting is to keep all the loans in a separate .skg file.

This way a car payment, e.g., can appear in the budget as a payment and also doesn't show up as income on the monthly report. If I keep the car loan in the same .skg, then the car payment is a payment from the bank and a payment into the loan. Technically, this is true, since I've just shifted money from one to the other and decreased the liability of the loan by the same amount that was moved from checking. So in the same .skg file, I've got a credit and debit for the car payment, and appears as a zero in the budget. Assets and liabilities are accurate, but budget is off. This also fixes the problem of the credit into the car loan appearing as "income" in monthly report.

I understand now the issue with budget and loan accounts. I can do a change where the operation in loan accounts are not considered by the budget module.
By this way, the expenditure for the car will be in the budget and the income in the loan account will not.

What do you think about this proposal?

rbruce wrote:
With a separate account for the loans, a car payment is simply a debit from checking. Budget shows I'm on track for the month for auto expenses. Disadvantage of this approach is that I can't automatically reconcile payments to the loan in the bank account with payments in the loan account, but since I'm reconciling both accounts vs. what the banks say, so it's workable. It's not as big a hassle as it sounds, really.

I suspect that this might be a good approach to the margin account problem your having, too. You will have to compute net worth externally . .

smankowski wrote:I understand now the issue with budget and loan accounts. I can do a change where the operation in loan accounts are not considered by the budget module.
By this way, the expenditure for the car will be in the budget and the income in the loan account will not.

What do you think about this proposal?

That sounds like it would work for me. It would be convenient to be able to track auto loans, mortgage loans, student loans, etc. all in the same .skg file yet still be able to get a snapshot with the monthly report and watch budget vs. actual expenses.

Hi,

I did a correction. Operations in "Loan" accounts are no more taken into account in "Incomes and Expenditures" widget and in budgets.

smankowski wrote:I did a correction. Operations in "Loan" accounts are no more taken into account in "Incomes and Expenditures" widget and in budgets.

Thanks Stephane, I will continue to keep my loan accounts in the same .skg file and see if the monthly report makes more sense. If it doesn't work, then I can always fall back to suggested workaround.