Ledger posting As we know, a business records all of its transactions in the journal. After the transactions are recorded in the journal, they are posted in the principal book called ‘Ledger’. Transferring the entries from journals to respective ledger accounts is called ledger posting or posting toRead more
Ledger posting
As we know, a business records all of its transactions in the journal. After the transactions are recorded in the journal, they are posted in the principal book called ‘Ledger’. Transferring the entries from journals to respective ledger accounts is called ledger posting or posting to the ledger accounts. Balancing of ledgers is carried out to find differences at the year’s end.
Posting to the ledger account means entering information in the ledger, and respective accounts from the journal for individual records. The accounts that are credited are posted to the credit side and vice versa.
Ledger maintenance is done at the end of an accounting period and it’s maintained to reflect a permanent summary of all the journal accounts. In the end, all the accounts that are entered and operated in the ledger are closed, totaled, and balanced. Balancing the ledger means finding the difference between the debit and credit amounts of a particular account.
While posting to the ledger account, suppose goods were bought for cash. While passing the journal entry, we’ll be debiting the purchases a/c and crediting the cash a/c by stating it as, ‘To Cash A/c’.
Now, this entry will be affecting both the purchases account and the cash account. In the cash account, we’ll be debiting purchases. Whereas in the purchases account, we’ll be crediting the cash. That’s how it works in the double-entry bookkeeping system of accounting.
Example
Mr. Tony Stark started the business with cash of $100,000 on April 1, 2021. He bought furniture for business for $15,000. He further purchased goods for $75,000.
Now, we’ll be journalizing the transactions and posting them into the ledger accounts.
Journal Entries

Posting to Ledger Account
Cash A/c

Capital A/c

Furniture A/c

Purchases A/c

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Specimen of Ledger account This is the specimen of a ledger account. J.F. here represents the journal folio. A Ledger account is an account that consists of all the business transactions that take place during the current financial year. For Example, cash, bank, machinery, A/c receivable account, etRead more
Specimen of Ledger account
This is the specimen of a ledger account. J.F. here represents the journal folio.
A Ledger account is an account that consists of all the business transactions that take place during the current financial year.
For Example, cash, bank, machinery, A/c receivable account, etc.
After the financial data is recorded in the Journal. It is then classified according to the nature of accounts viz. Asset, liability, expenses, revenue, and capital to be posted in the ledger account.
With this head, the identification as to whether the opening balance will come under the debit side or the credit side is done.
The table below would help to understand the concept of opening balance in the ledger.
For further clarification of the concept let me give you a practical example.
Suppose, a manufacturing firm Amul purchased machinery for, say, Rs 2,50,000. The installation charges were Rs 25,000 and the opening balance of machinery during the year was Rs 5,00,000.
So as the machinery account comes under the category assets, its opening balance would come under the debit side of the ledger account.
And as purchase and installation charges mean expenses for the firm, they would also come under the debit side of the account.
And in case of any sale of a part of the machinery, it would be posted on the credit side of the account as the sales would generate revenue for the firm.
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