[SL] Example of booking depreciable assets and depreciation?

[Ed W <li...@wi...>]

Hi

I'm sure that there are plenty of examples somewhere on the SL list, but 
I couldn't locate any easily with google.

Can someone please give me an example of the transactions required to 
book buying an item like an office printer, then adding it to the 
depreciable assets and finally knocking off 40% for the first years 
depreciation?

- I am using a fairly close to default COA. 
- I buy my printer with an AP invoice, booking it into something 
like an admin expenses account called "Computer Expenses". 
- I then put in a journal entry to transfer it from here into my capital 
assets ledger: "Office Furniture & Equipment "
- Then I put in another transaction to shift 40% from the capital assets 
account into "Accum. Amort. -Furn. & Equip. "

This all looks nearly correct on the balance sheet, but I don't appear 
to have the depreciation turning up on the Income Statement report?  
What am I missing?  Does this sound like the correct way to book the 
transaction?


What I *think* I am doing wrong is that last transaction?  Should the book assets account remain showing the full book value of the assets, and instead the transaction is something like credit "Computer expenses", debit "Accum. Amort. -Furn. & Equip. "?  This would seem to make more sense

Also, would it be better to set up the COA so that the AP invoice directly books into the capital assets account?  I guess Dieter intended these kinds of capital assets to be entered directly using a GL transaction rather than an AP invoice? In my case it's useful to track the seller details though

So, in conclusion should the correct transactions be:

- AP invoice -> Office Furniture and Equip (asset account)
- GL: "Accum. Amort. -Furn. & Equip. " -> "Computer Expenses" (or similar cost account?)

Cheers

Ed W