Chart of Accounts (COA) Dataset

A Chart of Accounts (COA) Dataset is a taxonomy dataset (with CoA taxonomy records) that represents a chart of accounts (of bookkeeping accounts).

• Context:
  • It can (typically) be composed of one or more CoA Segment Trees, such a CoA Object Segment Tree (with Expenditure Accounts, Revenue Accounts, Asset Accounts, Liability Accounts, equity accounts); and a CoA Department Segment Tree, and a CoA Fund Segment Tree.
  • It can range from being an Organization's CoA (such as an active CoA) to being an Idealized CoA (such as a standard CoA).
  • It can range from being a Government Entity CoA, a NGO CoA to being a For-Profit Organization CoA.
  • It can be an input to a CoA Processing Task, such as CoA matching task or CoA annotation task.
  • It can be referenced by a CoA Crosswalk.
  • …
• Example(s):
  • City of Palo Alto's 2015 Chart of Accounts,
  • Ohio's Standard CoA.
  • OpenGov's 2015 Chart of Accounts.
  • …
• Counter-Example(s):
  • a Organism Taxonomy.
  • a Product Taxonomy Dataset.
• See: SIE (File Format), Accounting Software, Salary Account, Benefits Account.

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References

2015

• (Wikipedia, 2015) ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/chart_of_accounts Retrieved:2015-9-22.
  • A chart of accounts (COA) is a created list of the accounts used by an organization to define each class of items for which money or the equivalent is spent or received. It is used to organize the finances of the entity and to segregate expenditures, revenue, assets and liabilities in order to give interested parties a better understanding of the financial health of the entity.

    Accounts are typically defined by an identifier (account number) and a caption or header and are coded by account type. In computerized accounting systems with computable quantity accounting, the accounts can have a quantity measure definition.

    The charts of accounts can be picked from a standard chart of accounts, like the BAS in Sweden. In some countries, charts of accounts are defined by the accountant from a standard general layouts or as regulated by law. However, in most countries it is entirely up to each accountant to design the chart of accounts.

    The list can use numerical, alphabetic, or alpha-numeric identifiers. However, in many computerized environments like the SIE format, only numerical identifiers are allowed. The structure and headings of accounts should assist in consistent posting of transactions. Each nominal ledger account is unique, which allows its ledger to be located. The list is typically arranged in the order of the customary appearance of accounts in the financial statements: balance sheet accounts followed by profit and loss accounts.

2014

• http://www.accountingcoach.com/bookkeeping/explanation/4
  • QUOTE: The chart of accounts is simply a list of all of the accounts that are available for recording transactions. This means that the number of accounts in the chart of accounts will be greater than the number of accounts in the general ledger. (The reason is that accounts with zero balances and no recent entries are often omitted from the general ledger until there is a transaction for the account.) The chart of accounts is organized similar to the general ledger: balance sheet accounts followed by the income statement accounts. However, the chart of accounts does not contain any entries or account balances. The chart of accounts allows you to find the name of an account, its account number, and perhaps a brief description. It is important to expand and/or alter the chart of accounts to accommodate the changes to an organization and when there is a need for improved reporting of information.

• (Purcell, 2014) ⇒ Melanie Purcell. (2014). “The Value of Regularly Reviewing the Chart of Accounts.” In: PM2 Connections Journal.
  • QUOTE: The current chart of accounts reflects:
    • Sources and uses of money.
    • Accounting structure.
    • Organizational structure.
    • The evolution and history of the accounting and organizational structure.
    • Activities and responsibilities of units within the structures.

2011

• (Cooper & Pattanayak, 2011) ⇒ Julie Cooper, and Sailendra Pattanayak. (2011). “Chart of Accounts: A Critical Element of the Public Financial Management Framework." International Monetary Fund.
  • QUOTE: The COA is an organized and coded listing of all the individual accounts that are used to record transactions and make up the ledger system.

    In particular:

    • The COA specifies how the financial transactions are recorded in a series of accounts that are required to be maintained to support the needs of various users / stakeholders. It defines the scope and content of these accounts for capturing the relevant financial information. This series of accounts is called the General Ledger (GL) and subsidiary ledgers, which record all transactions as per specifications in the COA.
    • The COA provides a coding structure for the classification and recording of relevant financial information (both flows and stocks) within the financial management and reporting system.

2005

• (Brandon, 2005) ⇒ Daniel Brandon. (2005). “Recursive Database Structures.” In: Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, 21(2).
  • QUOTE: In a forest there are multiple nodes without a master or "parent" nodes. This is illustrated in Figure 3, for the example of an accounting general ledger "chart of accounts". …

    … The most difficult obstacle with recursive relations concerns the navigation in each mapping direction and with a "rollup" process. Consider the case of a general ledger hierarchical chart of accounts as illustrated in Figure 3.

2001

• (McQuaig & Bille, 2001) ⇒ Douglas J McQuaig, and Patricia A Bille. (2001). “College Accounting." Houghton Mifflin.
  • QUOTE: Chart of accounts: The official list of account titles to be used to record the transactions of a business.

1997

• (Jaruga & Szychta, 1997) ⇒ Alicja A. Jaruga, and Anna Szychta. (1997). “The Origin and Evolution of Charts of Accounts in Poland." European Accounting Review, 6(3). doi:10.1080/713764733
  • ABSTRACT: Charts of accounts have played a vital role in the development of accountancy in Poland since the Second World War. In the period of the centrally-run economy the accounting of enterprises was based on uniform requirements. They included, among other things, the obligation to conduct accounting according to uniform or standard charts of accounts, which were frequently changed or modified temporarily. The radical political and economic transition in Poland after 1990 brought about changes to legal rules regulating accountancy. The changes aimed to reduce their number and complexity. Under the new legislation, business entities (apart from those in the budgetary sector and banks) develop individually their own plans of accounts which are best suited to financial reporting and management accounting purposes. This paper aims to give a synthetic presentation of the causes and effects of successive reforms of Polish plans of accounts as well as current practice concerning individual enterprise accounting plans.

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