Documentation -> Accounting/Bookkeeping -> Automated Book Depreciation -> Automated Book Depreciation Details

How does it work? What do i have to do?

Enable Automated Book Depreciation when creating a new set of books or editing a current set of books. flowlog will create a global depreciation expense account for that set of books. Anytime you create an account for depreciable assets, simply set the account as depreciable. flowlog will create the corresponding accumulated depreciation contra accounts, for you, when you save that depreciable assets account. Then, anytime you purchase a new depreciable asset or add an existing depreciable asset to flowlog, simply create your entry and an extra set of form fields will be shown for any entry item that belongs to a depreciable asset account. The info you enter into the extra form fields gives flowlog the information it needs to calculate the depreciation for those items. flowlog will calculate the depreciation for any depreciable assets on the last day of the fiscal year and make any necessary entries to record that depreciation.

What if i don't enable/use it?

You'll just need to create all necessary depreciation related accounts and create all depreciation related entries yourself.

Can i enable ABD after i have already been manually managing depreciation?

Assuming the asset was purchased during the current fiscal year, flowlog can still calculate the depreciation for the year. You'll need to enable Automated Book Depreciation in the book->edit page so flowlg can create the deprciation expense account. Then, create the new/clone depreciable asset account(s). flowlog will create the contra (accumulated depreciation) accounts and you can create the entry for the purchase of the asset. If you "cloned" the new account(s) from accounts you were manually managing in flowlog, you should then delete that/those old account(s).

Can i disable ABD after i have already been using it?

Sure, just create your manual accounts and your entries. Then disable Automated Book Depreciation. Finally, manually delete all the entries and accounts created by ABD. There is not an "unwind everything" feature for that scenario at this time.

What happens when an asset finishes depreciating?

flowlog will depreciate an asset until it can depreciate no more, then send you an email letting you know. flowlog doesn't clear the asset from your books. You will need to create the entry for that.

Exception to the rule!

The flowlog demo is designed to be used for up to two weeks at a time, so it handles Automated Book Depreciation a little differently. It just calculates the depreciation for the given month (using the total expected lifetime months of the item) so that you can test the feature to some degree. It also doesn't bother sending an email if the asset were to be fully depreciated.