Credit balance means excess of credit side over debit side. For example, At the beginning of the year, the credit balance of trade payable is 3,000 and there is a debit of trade payable of 1,000 during the year and an increase(credit) of trade payable of 4,000 then at the end there will be a creditRead more
Credit balance means excess of credit side over debit side.
For example, At the beginning of the year, the credit balance of trade payable is 3,000 and there is a debit of trade payable of 1,000 during the year and an increase(credit) of trade payable of 4,000 then at the end there will be a credit balance of 6,000 of trade payable at the end
.A Credit balance signifies all income and gains and all liabilities and capital that is there in business.
Liabilities and Capital
- Account Payables– Account Payables means the amount that is due to the customer by the entity. Its credit balance will always increase when there is an increase in account payables and will decrease when there is a decrease in account payables. For eg-: The stock that has been purchased in credit from creditors of 10,000 will result in an increase in credit balance.
- Bank Overdraft-Bank Overdraft means when the amount withdrawn from the bank is more than the balance left in the bank. For example, there is a bank balance of 2,000 in the bank but an amount of 4,000 has been withdrawn from the bank. So in such a case, there will be a credit balance of 2,000 which is in Bank Overdraft
- Bonds– Bonds are the amount that is withdrawn from people for a specific time period which gets redeemed at a coupon rate after such a specific period. For example- A 10% bond of 10,000 is given to a group of people which will be redeemed after 5 years.
- Income Tax Payables-Income Tax Payable means the amount the company left to pay to the government in earlier periods. For example- There is a tax liability of 10,000 in FY20-21 from which 8,000 was paid in the current year and 2,000 paid in FY21-22.
- Notes Payable– Notes Payable is a type of promissory note in which a person pays some amount to an entity that the entity will write in a specific period. For example Notes payable of 1,000 given by a person to an entity which will be returned in 3 months with interest
- Capital– Capital means the amount that is introduced by the company at the beginning of the business for the operations and survival of the business. For example- A capital of 10,000 has been introduced by the company.
Income and Gains
- Interest Received-Interest Received means the amount which is invested by the company in some other entity and interest received on it
- Dividend Received– Dividend means the amount received from the entity in which amount invested by the company
- Rent Received– Rent is the amount that the company receives by letting out their land to another person or entity for use
- Gains on Sale of Furniture– Gain on Sale of Furniture means that the amount received from the sale of furniture is more than the amount of furniture. So the difference between the amount received from the sale and the cost of furniture is called a gain on the sale of furniture.
So after seeing all the above points we can conclude that the credit balance includes all the income in the P&L account and all the liabilities in the Balance sheet. So its balance increases when there is an increase in its account.
Debit Balance
Debit balance means excess of credit side over debit side.
For Example- At begining of the year the debit balance of trade receivables is 3,000 and there is a decrease(credit) of trade receivables of 1,000 during the year and an increase(debit) of trade receivables of 4,000 then at the end there will be a debit balance of 6,000 of trade receivables at the end
A Debit balance basically signifies all expenses and losses and all positive balances of assets. The debit balance increases when any asset increases and decreases when any asset decreases.
Asset
- Cash and Bank Balance
- Account Receivables
- Property, Plant, and Equipment
- Inventory
- Investments
- Bill Receivables
- Intangible Assets
Expenses and Loses
- Rent
- Depreciation
- General Expenses
- Loss on Sale of asset
- Printing and stationery
- Audit fees
- Outstanding fees
- Salaries and Wages
- Insurance
- Advertising
- Promotional expenses
 
Bad debts mean the money owed by customers who have gone bankrupt or the likelihood of who's ever returning the money is significantly low. Bad debt is a nominal account. A nominal account is an account that records the business transactions belonging to a certain category of income, expense, profitRead more
Bad debts mean the money owed by customers who have gone bankrupt or the likelihood of who’s ever returning the money is significantly low. Bad debt is a nominal account.
A nominal account is an account that records the business transactions belonging to a certain category of income, expense, profit or loss. The balances on nominal accounts are normally written off at the end of each financial year. For example, sales A/c, purchases A/c, interest income, loss from the sale of assets etc.
Why are bad debts A/c classified as a nominal account?
First of all, let us understand the other two types of accounts – personal accounts and real accounts.
Personal accounts deal with the records of the business’ transactions with a particular person or entity. For example Mukesh A/c, Mahesh A/c, Reliance A/c, Suresh and Co. A/c etc.
Real accounts deal with transactions and records related to assets. The balance in these accounts is normally carried forward from one period to another. For example “Furniture A/c “, ” Building A/c ” etc.
Now that we have understood the basic definitions of all three types of accounts, we can discuss the reason behind the classification of bad debts as nominal accounts.
A bad debt is a loss that the company has incurred. It may be due to bankruptcy of customers, customer fraud etc. The company isn’t going to receive that money. The bad debts are written off at the end of the year by transferring them to profit and loss A/c.
Thus, bad debts relate to loss and are normally not carried forward from one period to another. Hence, they are classified as nominal accounts.
Treatment of Bad Debts
Bad debts are written off at the end of each year by debiting them to the profit and loss A/c. The amount of bad debts is reduced from the amount of debtors that the company has.
A company may also choose to create a provision for bad debts for the balance amount of debtors that the company has after adjusting for bad debts. This provision represents a rough estimate of the amount due to debtors that the business expects to not receive. In other words, it is an estimate of customer bankruptcy that the business expects.
Conclusion
We can conclude that
- There are primarily three types of accounts – real, personal and nominal.
- Bad debts are a nominal account.
- Bad debts is a loss that the business has incurred
- It may be due to bankruptcy of customers, fraud etc
- Bad debts are written off each year by transferring them to the income statement
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