PawCom Application Note 101: Peachtree's Internal Period Numbers ================================================================ 6/18/03 When you set up a Peachtree company one of the things you must specify is the number of accounting periods per year. On all of the forms and many of the reports there are only two years that are visible, the current year and the next year. So the number of displayable accounting periods is 2 x the number of periods per year. For a typical company there will be 12 periods per year, so the period numbers that Peachtree displays on its forms run from 1 to 24. You will also see period number 0 displayed sometimes for records that are before the current year. When you examine records with PawCom or Crystal Reports for Peachtree, you will see that the journal records have a field called "Period", but this field is not the same thing at all as the period Peachtree displays on its forms. The relationship between these internal periods, which Peachtree calls System Period Numbers, and the displayed periods is not entirely obvious. Up through V7 Peachtree explained the difference between these two kinds of periods in their User's Guide in the chapter on Dynamic Data Exchange. However, later versions no longer have this information. It actually can be found in the online documentation but you have to really be determined to find it, because it isn't easy to locate: the only link to it is called "Peachtree System Accounting Period Numbers" and is only found on the page for the topic DDE:Overview. Internally Peachtree actually stores three years of data in separate periods: the prior year, the current year, and the next year and Peachtree allows up to 13 accounting periods per year. These internal periods, which Peachtree calls System Period Numbers, do not map in an obvious way into the periods that are displayed on the forms. The internal periods are numbered 0 to 41, and have the following meaning: 0 Transactions prior to the prior year. 1-13 Possible accounting periods for the prior year. 14 Prior year closing balances. 15-27 Possible accounting periods for the current year (first displayed year). 28 Current year closing balances. 29-41 Possible accounting periods for the next year (second displayed year). The following examples illustrate how the internal period numbers are related to the displayed period numbers for companies with different setups. Company A - 12 periods/year, Jan to Dec --------------------------------------- Internal Period Displayed Period Sample dates --------------- ---------------- ---------------------------- 0 Prior to 1/1/2002 1-12 1/1/2002 to 12/31/2002 13 14 Prior year closing amounts 15-26 1-12 1/1/2003 to 12/31/2003 27 28 current year closing amounts 29-40 13-24 1/1/2004 to 12/31/2004 41 Company B - 12 periods/year, Jul to Jun --------------------------------------- Internal Period Displayed Period Sample dates --------------- ---------------- ---------------------------- 0 Prior to 7/1/2002 1-12 7/1/2002 to 6/30/2003 13 14 Prior year closing amounts 15-26 1-12 7/1/2003 to 6/30/2004 27 28 current year closing amounts 29-40 13-24 7/1/2004 to 6/30/2005 41 Company C - 13 periods/year, Jan to Dec --------------------------------------- Internal Period Displayed Period Sample dates --------------- ---------------- ---------------------------- 0 Prior to 1/1/2002 1-13 1/1/2002 to 12/31/2002 14 Prior year closing amounts 15-27 1-13 1/1/2003 to 12/31/2003 28 current year closing amounts 29-41 14-26 1/1/2004 to 12/31/2004 Company D - 4 periods/year, Jan to Dec -------------------------------------- Internal Period Displayed Period Sample dates --------------- ---------------- ---------------------------- 0 Prior to 1/1/2002 1 1/1/2002 to 3/31/2002 2 4/1/2002 to 6/30/2002 3 7/1/2002 to 9/30/2002 4 10/1/2002 to 12/31/2002 5-13 14 Prior year closing amounts 15 1/1/2003 to 3/31/2003 16 4/1/2003 to 6/30/2003 17 7/1/2003 to 9/30/2003 18 10/1/2003 to 12/31/2003 19-27 28 Current year closing amounts 29 1/1/2004 to 3/31/2004 30 4/1/2004 to 6/30/2004 31 7/1/2004 to 9/30/2004 32 10/1/2004 to 12/31/2004 33-41