accounting software *free & open source*

[Ori Idan]

On Sun, Jul 7, 2013 at 8:16 AM, E.S. Rosenberg <esr at g.jct.ac.il> wrote:

> 2013/7/7 Ori Idan <ori at helicontech.co.il>:
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Jul 7, 2013 at 1:53 AM, Geoffrey S. Mendelson
> > <geoffreymendelson at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> On 7/7/2013 1:20 AM, Micha Feigin wrote:
> >>
> >>> On the other hand as memory serves, you can run your books using an
> open
> >>> source software and then submit the printouts to a certified accounted
> >>> to make a legal report. You may need to work with generic receipts in
> >>> parallel though.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> As it was explained to me by my accountant, the tax authorities don't
> care
> >> how you keep YOUR books, they only care that the submissions to them are
> >> done properly.
> >>
> >> Properly means that an accepted (certified?) program is used and that
> the
> >> data was entered by a level 3 (starts at 1) certified bookkeeper or a
> >> certified public accountant (CPA).
> >>
> >> In real terms this means for small business the data is sent to your
> >> accountant and they (or their certified bookkeeper) enters it into their
> >> program on their computer and submits that to the tax authorities.
> >>
> >> At that point the responsibility for the data being entered properly and
> >> the program being a legal one is borne by your accountant and not you.
> >>
> >> IMHO this is preferable because my experience in being an independent
> >> consultant, the owner of a small consulting firm, and involved with
> startups
> >> over various times, is that any money spent paying a professional to
> keep
> >> your books and prepare your tax returns is well worth it. YMMV.
> >>
> >> Most accountants will accept data in XLS (Excel spreadsheet format), so
> >> you can enter the data in an Excel spreadsheet and send them the file.
> >>
> >> I assume that an Excel spreadsheet created and maintained by OpenOffice
> >> would be acceptable to them.
> >>
> >> Geoff.
> >>
> >>
> > Tax authorities has nothing against OSS software and they already gave
> > approval to OSS software twice (Drorit, my software and it's fork Linet,
> > both GPL).
> > The real truth is that they only ask to see several things:
> > 1. Invoices can not be deleted and numbered sequentially without
> repeating.
> > 2. No simple ability to delete transcations
> > 3. Output of what they call Open Format files, these are files with all
> > transactions in a special format they require.
> >
> > That is all, no question about OSS or not.
> > There was a debate last time they registered Linet and they agreed to
> > register it so they have nothing against OSS.
> > GNUCASH can not be registered since it can not output Open Format files.
> >
> > Note that I have good experience and knowledge about the subject as I
> make a
> > living out of Accounting software.
> > I have written several software packages and also consult business about
> the
> > same.
>
> Both drorit and linet run server side, gnucash runs on my computer and
> the tax authority has no way of knowing whether I doctored my version
> of gnucash.
> Even with drorit and linet, will the tax authority accept it if I
> install it on my server (and as a result have full control over all
> the demands you listed) or did they only approve the version running
> on company X's servers?
> Logically it seems only the second would be the case...
>

Linet does not run on a server it is run locally.
The request is that you can not change or delete transactions from the
software itself or by a normal user.
There is no request to not be able to change at all. They accept that
knowledgeable user with root privileges on the system can delete
transactions.

-- 
Ori Idan
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