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How to migrate open payables/receivables

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Posted on by ahanson

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Hello,

I'm prepping for a go-live of Business Central. We have written configuration packages for open sales and purchase orders, but how do you bring in open payables and receivables? I attempted a configuration package for the open receivables using the customer ledger entry table, but that is not successful. Do we utilize the sales journal or something else for open receivables? And what is the best format for open payables? It is difficult to find this information documented. FYI - This is a migration from NAV 5.0, so at least the data is similar, but not identical. I was able to export the details using Object Designer in NAV from the ledger tables.

Thank you in advance!

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Dynamics 365 Business Central

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Omar K 201 on at

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Hi,

This will be a long answer, so bring your cup of tea before start reading and it applies for both AR and AP.

For AR use "Sales Journal" and for AP use "Purchase Journal"

Create 3 G/L Accounts "Balance Sheet" the net effect after the opening balances for all will be Zero " why balance sheet ?" because I don't want to inflate the retained earnings account when you close the year "You can make them income statement tho" , make the account no. starts with something like 999 so they appear at the end of the chart of account list.

99999 -> Opening Balance Intermediate Account.

99998 -> AR Opening Balance Intermediate Account.

99997 -> AP Intermediate Account.

What I want to do is to post the opening balances to these accounts without affecting the normal G/L account for AR and AP (as I suppose the opening balance for the real AR and AP accounts will be imported in the G/L opening balance journal"

In both use the Account 99999 in the "Balance Account No. " field.

Back up the posting groups and then update the accounts receivables and account payables G/L Account in the Posting Groups to 99998 (for AR) and 99997 (for AP). once the posting is completed you can revert back the posting groups Remember users should NOT be posting until the posting groups are back as they were.

Post the 2 Journals (AR) and (AP)

Revert back the posting groups.

What fields do you need:

Posting Date: is the opening balances date.

Document Date: it can be the opening balances date or the real document date (If you used the real document date, the aging report will only match the G/L at the opening balances date)

Due Date: Is important , import it don't let Business Central use the default.

Customer No. of course.

Description: You can use old description but add something like - OB as of "xx/zz/yyyy" just to make it easy for the user to know that this transaction is in the opening balance.

Document No.: you can use the transaction no from the old system, something like "OB-0001"

External Document No. if required.

Document Type is important

After posting:

99998 should have the total balance for the AR , this should match the real AR G/L Accounts balance.

99997 should have the total balance for the AP , this should match the real AP G/L Accounts balance.

99999: should have accounts (99998 + 99997) - so the net effect is zero.

Remember to revert back the posting groups after posting.

You can import the balances in another way, this is one of them.

The second way is:

When you import the G/L journal opening balance, replace the AR account with 99998 and the AP with 99997.

Import the balances and use 99998 and 99997 in the balance account No. without updating the posting groups.

so 99998 is debited when you import the G/L Journal and credited when you post the AR opening balance. the real AR account will be debited when you post the AR opening balance journal.

Hope this helps.

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YUN ZHU 95,329 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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Hi, I don't know how your Chart Of Account balance is imported. Generally speaking, it is imported into General Journals first by Configuration Package, and then post.

On this page, you can also find some templates directly.

Hope this helps as well.
Thanks.

ZHU

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Dallefeld 211 User Group Leader on at

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Omar did a great job of explaining but I hate chart of accounts just for opening balances. Simply do not populate balance account no. Rather load all your AR and AP into the journal that Omar designated. Before you post these journals you should see the total amount, use this to reconcile the associated opening GL accounts. Create additional line(s) for the offset (negative for AR and positive for AP)--note you have to set direct posting to true for AP and AR accounts. Post your journal and turn direct posting off.

The rest of the details from Omar are great!

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SM-11081233-0 4 on at

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In Omar's answer the last bullet was

Document Type is important

As well as Invoice & Credit Note are other transaction types available;

Advance

On account payment

Thanks, S

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Sohail Ahmed 11,136 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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You can’t import directly into Customer/Vendor Ledger Entries. The proper way is to bring open receivables through the Sales or General Journal and open payables through the Purchase or General Journal, usually against a clearing G/L account. This ensures BC creates the correct ledger entries and allows proper application later.

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