Etapa 6 – Desarrollo de Esquema Básico:
7- Desarrollo de Estrategias Proyectuales a Nivel Urbano
New General Ledger Accounting
Unit Overview
With SAP ERP Central Component, the SAP system offers an interesting alternative in General Ledger Accounting:
New General Ledger Accounting (New G/L)
Unit Objectives
After completing this unit, you will be able to:
• Describe how new General Ledger Accounting works in conjunction with Profit Center Accounting
• Understand the settings for defining ledgers • Understand the settings for document splitting
• Understand the settings for real-time CO → FI integration
Unit Contents
Lesson: New General Ledger Accounting - Basic Information ... 36 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers ... 43
Lesson: New General Ledger Accounting - Basic
Information
Lesson Overview
With SAP ERP, SAP offers an interesting alternative in General Ledger Accounting:
General Ledger Accounting (new) - or new G/L.
Lesson Objectives
After completing this lesson, you will be able to:
• Describe how new General Ledger Accounting works in conjunction with Profit Center Accounting
Business Example
Your company management is considering using Profit Center Accounting in new General Ledger Accounting for an implementation of SAP ERP Financials. They would like to know what advantages this has in terms of Profit Center Accounting.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: New General Ledger Accounting - Basic Information
* Info for existing customers: If you think the advantages of new G/L are useful,
you can convert to new General Ledger Accounting in a migration project. The migration to new G/L is only possible after the upgrade to SAP ERP.
For more information, see www.service.sap.com/GLMIG.
Hint: Information for new customers: To obtain more information
about the new G/L system settings in case of a new installation, see SAP
Note 756146.
New G/L advantages - Overview:
• The new G/L uses an extended data structure as standard. You can also add customer fields to the totals table in the new General Ledger, for inclusion in financial statements.
• Using document splitting, you can create financial statements for entities such as segments and profit centers, entities below the company code level. • Reconciliation between CO and FI can be carried out in real time – real-time
integration between CO and FI – making time-consuming reconciliation
activities a thing of the past.
• The ledger solution (within new G/L) is a new approach to picture parallel accounting in an SAP system.
Figure 25: General Ledger Accounting (New): One Component - Many Functions
Prior to SAP ERP, SAP customers had to have a variety of components installed and in use to optimally fulfill the international or industry-specific requirements and standards. The situation may be even more critical in cases where service enterprises (for example, in the areas public sector, insurance companies, media) increasingly require financial statements that fulfill other criteria, such as grant, fund, or industry sectors. The increasing importance of IFRS as an accounting principle is giving rise to increased demands for the improved quality and capability of modeling segment reporting. A standardized solution is also relevant to areas such as fast closing and Sarbanes-Oxley.
Overview of the totals tables in the conventional components: • Classic FI: Table GLT0
• COS ledger: Table GLFUNCT • Reconciliation ledger: Table COFIT
TFIN22_1 Lesson: New General Ledger Accounting - Basic Information
Figure 26: Advantages of new General Ledger Accounting – Overview
The new General Ledger Accounting and new general ledger are both abbreviated as "new G/L". Basic architecture of the new G/L in SAP ERP: SAP Note 918675. The user interfaces for entering data and postings are nearly identical to the UIs in the previous release, despite all the new features.
Cost-of-Sales Accounting and Profit Centers
Figure 27: Assignment of Functional Areas in the P&L Statement
When you use the period accounting approach, the system breaks down the operating results by revenue and cost element. This makes it possible to recognize which factors of production cause the costs that are incurred. The total costs for the
period can then be compared to the total revenues earned during the same period. These costs include the costs of all the goods and services that were produced in the period but have not yet been sold (increases in stock) plus the goods and services produced in previous periods and sold in this period (reductions in stock). This sum, together with the capitalized internal activities and the changes to work
in process, yields the total result for the period.
The more sales-oriented cost-of-sales approach compares the costs to the corresponding quantity structure of the revenues. Revenues are only compared to the costs incurred for the quantity of goods or services sold. When products are sold from stock, it may be that the costs were incurred during a previous period. In this approach, no distinction is made between different cost elements. Instead, resource usage is divided according to the functions R&D, production, sales, and administration.
To calculate profits according to the cost-of-sales approach, you need to use the derived functional area characteristic.
You can use period accounting and/or cost-of-sales accounting in Profit Center Accounting. If you want to use cost-of-sales accounting, you have to activate the COS accounting scenario and configure the corresponding settings.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: New General Ledger Accounting - Basic Information
This slide shows the following example postings: • Sales revenues from SD (1)
• Cost of goods sold from MM goods issue (2)
• Production variances from the settlement of the production order (3) • All debits and credits of all the production cost centers (overabsorption/un-
derabsorption) (3a)
• All postings to cost centers affecting the functional areas Sales, Administration and Research & Development (3b)
• Adjustment postings resulting from real-time integration back to new G/L in the case of secondary, cross-functional area postings (3c)
• Postings to profitability segments (4) • Other expenses (5)
Lesson Summary
You should now be able to:
• Describe how new General Ledger Accounting works in conjunction with Profit Center Accounting
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger
Accounting for Profit Centers
Lesson Overview
This lesson shows the basic settings needed in new General Ledger Accounting to assign profit center accounts. The settings apply not only to profit centers, but also to all additional account assignments in Financial Accounting for which you want to map complete financial statements.
Lesson Objectives
After completing this lesson, you will be able to: • Understand the settings for defining ledgers • Understand the settings for document splitting
• Understand the settings for real-time CO → FI integration
Business Example
Your company activated the new general ledger to capture the benefits of a single, uniform data structure, document splitting, and real-time CO → FI integration. After migration from the conventional general ledger to General Ledger Accounting (new), you want to map organizational divisions as profit centers to report full financial statements and profitability analysis. You are a member of the project team that has been asked to verify whether the necessary settings have been made in the test system.
Ledger Definition and Profit Centers
Figure 29: Activating New General Ledger Accounting
The new general ledger is always active in new installations (SAP ERP). If existing customers decide that they want to use the new general ledger, it must be activated using a Customizing transaction (=> FAGL_ACTIVATION). In practice, setting the activation switch (for existing customers) is one of the final activities of a migration project. The activation switch is set for each client. The activation causes system-wide changes that affect the application and Customizing paths.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Figure 30: Benefits in Detail - Extended Data Structure
More entities are updated in the totals table of the new general ledger
(FAGLFLEXT) than possible in the classic totals table (GLT0). The new standard fields include profit center, segment, functional area, and cost center. You can expand the totals table FAGLFLEXT with additional fields – in addition to the SAP fields that are already present; these can be new, customer-specific fields.
The fields updated using these scenarios can then be used to construct business situations - for example, Profit Center Accounting with segment reporting and/or cost-of-sales accounting. To see the available scenarios, choose the following Customizing path: Financial Accounting (New) → Financial Accounting Global
Settings (New) → Ledgers → Fields → Display Scenarios for General Ledger Accounting. You cannot define customer-specific scenarios. The delivered
scenarios are assigned to the ledgers in Customizing: Financial Accounting (New)
→ Financial Accounting Global Settings (New) →, Ledgers → Ledger → Assign Scenarios and Customer Fields to Ledgers. You can assign one, several, or even
all six scenarios to a ledger. The decision as to how many scenarios you should assign depends solely on the question: Which situations or business aspects do you want to model in the general ledger?
Figure 32: Entry and General Ledger View
The posting screens and document views look the same from the end user perspective. However, the general ledger view provides the additional “internal view” of the document.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Figure 33: Scenarios - Assignment and Functions (1)
The Purchased Services account (417000) is defined as a primary cost element in CO, and therefore requires a CO-relevant account assignment at entry. The profit center characteristic and functional area are then derived from the CO object (such as cost center). You can now derive the segment characteristic from the profit center characteristic.
If you do not assign any scenarios, none of the entities will be inherited to the general ledger. Impact of a missing scenario assignment: If you now call up a balance sheet (and profit & loss statement), the system displays the amount of €50.00 on the Activities Purchased account. However, it is impossible to assign the accounting transaction to a business area, a functional area, a profit center, or any other entity. Therefore, it is also impossible to call up segment financial statements if you have not assigned any scenarios to a ledger. Subsequent changes of scenario assignments to a ledger in General Ledger Accounting can result in serious inconsistencies in document processing. Deleting scenario assignments can also result in inconsistencies. An appropriate warning message appears when you try to make these changes in Customizing.
Excerpt from SAP Note 891144 - New GL/Document splitting: Risks w/subsequent changes: “In contrast with the special ledger or the EC-PCA, subsequent changes are not considered in the general ledger (new) since the ledgers of the general ledger (new) are not comparable with a special ledger or the EC-PCA. In fact, the general ledger (new) is a general ledger from a business point of view and is therefore legally comparable with the classic General Ledger, the GLT0 ledger 00. Thus, there is an auditing requirement. ...”
Figure 34: Scenarios - Assignment and Functions (2)
Since the profit center update and segment reporting scenarios are assigned to the leading ledger, 0L, these two entities are both updated in the general ledger and displayed in the corresponding general ledger view. The Functional Area field, for example, is not updated or displayed in the general ledger view, since this scenario was not previously assigned to the leading ledger. However, scenario assignment cannot manage a "zero balance setting" for any given entity.
In more detail, using a profit center (PC) as an example: It would not (yet) be possible to create complete profit center financial statements, because the profit center has not (yet) been enriched in posting lines 2 and 3. To do this, you also have to configure and activate document splitting.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Figure 35: Using the Segment Entity
Segments can be used to fulfill the requirements of international accounting regulations (IFRS or US-GAAP) after you use segment reporting.
Excerpt from IFRS 8: Operating Segments
5. An operating segment is a component of an entity:
a) that engages in business activities from which it may earn revenues and incur expenses (including revenues and expenses relating to transactions with other components of the same entity);
b) whose operating results are reviewed regularly by the entity's chief operating decision maker to make decisions about resources to be allocated to the segment and assess its performance; and
c) for which discrete financial information is available.
Otherwise, you can also use the objects business area or profit center. The segment is also available, since the business area and/or profit center were often used for other purposes in the past, and, therefore, fulfill other requirements.
Document Splitting and Profit Centers
Figure 36: Document Splitting – Reasons
The system requirements could be even simpler - it is not necessary for the expense lines to contain different profit center assignments. The root of the requirement is that, for example, the payable items line (of the general ledger view) must have a "profit center account assignment" if proper profit center financial statements are to be created at all.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Figure 37: Document Splitting Characteristics
To define the splitting characteristics, choose the following menu path in Customizing: Financial Accounting (New) → General Ledger Accounting (New)
→ Business Transactions → Document Splitting → Define Document Splitting Characteristics for General Ledger Accounting. The system uses the assigned
scenarios to propose useful document splitting characteristics. If you decide to use more splitting characteristics, make sure that they are contained in at least one ledger. Set the Zero Balance indicator, if you want to create a balance sheet for the characteristic. This ensures that the balance of these entities is set to 0 in each posting, which makes an "entity balance sheet" possible. The required field indicator has two meanings: Firstly, it extends the field status for accounts whose characteristics are not ready for input during document entry, or for accounts that cannot be controlled using field status. Example: The vendor line should always contain a profit center or segment. Secondly, it checks whether a business transaction variant that is equivalent to a business-process is used (and thus, a splitting rule can be found).
Figure 38: Activating Document Splitting
To activate document splitting, go to Customizing for the new general ledger:
Financial Accounting (New) → General Ledger Accounting (New) → Business Transactions → Document Splitting → Activate Document Splitting. The standard
splitting procedure delivered by SAP is splitting procedure 0000000012. If you activate document splitting, there is no reason why you should not activate inheritance as well. Activating the inheritance when document splitting is active allows you to post documents without having to make any other changes in Customizing. Inheritance is carried out online at the document line level. If you want to use a default account assignment, you must first create a new constant in Customizing:
Financial Accounting (New) → General Ledger Accounting (New) → Business Transactions → Document Splitting → Edit Constants for Nonassigned Processes
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Figure 39: Document Splitting - Active Split
The entities that you defined as document splitting characteristics are inherited by the posting lines without account assignment. As you can see clearly on the slide, the selected characteristics balance to zero. In this rule-based split, the vendor and tax lines (items 1 and 4) are split in the same way as the expense lines/the expense basic item category (items 2 and 3; expense accounts 477000 and 417000) in the general ledger view.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
treated in the individual business transactions; for example, whether or not the system should copy the account assignment of a customer item from the revenue item in a customer invoice. The business transaction is a general subgroup of actual business processes, which is delivered by SAP and to which extensive item categories are assigned. The business transaction variant is a specific version of the business transaction provided by SAP, and is a (technical) representation of a real business process for document splitting. An item category is a (technical) representation of the posted document lines. It describes the items that can be found within a document (a business transaction). They are derived from the balance types of the G/L accounts, among others. In other words, the item category is the semantic description used for document splitting. The individual splitting rules define which item categories can/should be split (item categories to be edited), and at the same time, determines the basis on which the split can take place (base item categories).
Figure 42: Simulating the General Ledger View
In Release SAP ERP 6.0 and later, you can simulate the general ledger view as well as the entry view before posting. This allows you to analyze, earlier and more effectively, errors that would cause a termination during posting. You can display the detail data of the document split using the expert mode.
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers
Real-Time CO-FI Integration and Profit Centers
Real-time integration is used to copy internal Controlling postings to Financial Accounting and its account assignments, including Profit Center Accounting.
Figure 45: Real-Time CO-FI Integration
SAP has had real-time integration from financial accounting (FI) to management accounting (=> CO) for a long time. The other way around, from CO to FI was previously not possible in real time. This affects changes to characteristics for the following processing/transactions such as: Periodic clearings (assessment, distribution, reposting). Manual repostings in CO [transaction codeKB11(N)]. Activity allocations [transaction code KB21(N)]. Settling orders or projects [transaction codes KO88 and CJ88]. The reconciliation ledger that was to be maintained in the cost element invoice is always used to reconcile CO with financial accounting. Summary standardizing entries and reconciliation postings were made with periodic program runs for each cost element/expense account: Transaction code KALC. The transaction KALCis no longer usable after activating the new general ledger by default – you will be notified of the real-time integration between CO and FI.
Figure 46: Variants for Real-Time Integration
To define the variants for real-time CO→FI integration, choose the following Customizing path:
Financial Accounting (New) → Financial Accounting Global Settings (New) → Ledgers → Real-Time Integration of Controlling with Financial Accounting → Define Variants for Real-Time Integration
In a subsequent step, assign the variant to your company code(s).
To determine the characteristic changes for which real-time FI document lines need to be created, you can also define Boolean rules in addition to the checkboxes, or implement your own logic by programming a BAdI. It is impractical to select characteristics that were not originally assigned to at least one ledger using the scenarios.
The key date activation date determines the time (or date of the CO document posting) after which the reconciliation between CO and FI using the real-time integration can be executed. You can also generate FI documents for CO
documents that were entered before activation of the new general ledger. You must define an account determination to be able to transfer secondary cost elements from CO into FI. To maintain account determination choose:
Financial Accounting (New) → Financial Accounting Global Settings (New) → Ledgers → Real-Time Integration of Controlling with Financial Accounting →
TFIN22_1 Lesson: Global Settings in New General Ledger Accounting for Profit Centers