Re: Accountancy for a webshop/ecommerce system

[Lester Caine <lester@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Per Jessen wrote:
> Rene Veerman wrote:
>
> > What i'm worried about is the accounting part of a webshop system.
> > I've downloaded some accounting manuals and programs, to see 'how its
> > done'. I've also downloaded some other webshop php apps (notably
> > oscommerce.com) to see how they do things.
> >
> > OS-commerce provides very little reporting. There's no balance sheet,
> > no statement of loss/profits, etc.
> > I'm wondering how a webshop operator/owner would keep track of
> > inventory and profits/losses.
>
> I don't know much about e.g. osCommerce, but I would expect a webshop
> system to only provide the input for a general ledger- and/or
> inventory-system.  Just like a human shop-assistant or cashier does
> when he/she operates the check-out register. 
>
> > Taken to the extreme, a webshop system would require accountancy
> > reporting functionality, a general ledger, journals, etc.
>
> This sounds like a severe case of scope-creep.  I don't think any of
> that belongs in a webshop system, just like a webshop doesn't belong in
> a general ledger system. 

I'd second that - to an extent.

Some tracking of costs does form part of the 'shop', such as the value of the 
stock currently held, and adding stock WITH it's cost makes sense in this 
situation as at least you can then see where an increase in the supply price 
hits your margin on the sale price. So you should be able to see THAT from 
shop admin. I'm not sure if zencart has the costings elements in it, but the 
bitweaver port of zencart which I'm using does and I assume that was part of 
the port.

My ACCOUNTANT prefers that the company accounts are in Sage, and things like 
'capitol depreciation', rent, insurance and other abstract accounting concepts 
are much more appropriate there. But the transfer between the two is simply a 
monthly total on sales, and a summary for the record of how it is made up. In 
my case this ties up with a printout of the Paypal receipts for the same 
period, and the 'finance' costs can then be added to the Sage accounts as a 
bank charge. Although factoring the Paypal (or other payment service) charges 
back into the shops own profit margin calculation could be useful.

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Lester Caine - G8HFL
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