Journal Entries

Create, review, approve, and post journal entries to record financial transactions.

Journal entries are the building blocks of your accounting records. Every financial transaction — whether it is a sale, a purchase, a payment, or a correction — is recorded as a journal entry with balanced debits and credits.

Accounting

Viewing journal entries

The Journal Entries page shows a list of all entries with their key details:

Column	Description
Number	A unique reference (e.g. JE-001, JE-002) assigned automatically
Date	The transaction date — when the event occurred, not when it was recorded
Description	A summary of what the entry records
Source	How the entry was created — Manual, Order, Purchase Order, Supplier Invoice, Payment, Depreciation, and others
Debit	The total debit amount
Credit	The total credit amount (always equals the debit total)
Status	The current state of the entry

Journal statuses

Status	Meaning
Draft	The entry has been created but not yet posted to the ledger. It can still be edited.
Awaiting Approval	The entry has been submitted and is waiting for someone with approval permission to review it.
Posted	The entry has been posted to the general ledger and now affects account balances and reports.
Reversed	The entry has been reversed by a separate correcting entry. Both the original and the reversal remain visible for audit purposes.

Filtering entries

You can filter the list by:

Status — Draft, Awaiting Approval, Posted, or Reversed
Source — Manual, Order, Purchase Order, Supplier Invoice, Payment Received, Payment Made, Reversal, Opening Balance, or Depreciation

Creating a journal entry

Click New Journal

Click the New Journal button at the top of the page. This opens the journal entry form.

Set the header fields

Fill in the header information:

Transaction Date — The date the transaction occurred. This determines which fiscal period the entry falls into.
Client — If your organisation manages multiple clients, select which client this entry relates to.
Description — A brief explanation of what the entry records (e.g. "Office rent — January 2026").

Set the currency (if applicable)

If your organisation uses multiple currencies, you can select the currency for this entry. For foreign currency entries, you will also need to enter the exchange rate. The system shows the base currency equivalent alongside each amount.

Add journal lines

Each line represents one side of the transaction. Every line requires:

Account — Select a general ledger account from your chart of accounts
Description — An optional line-level description
Debit — The debit amount (leave blank if this line is a credit)
Credit — The credit amount (leave blank if this line is a debit)

Click Add Line to add more rows. A journal entry must have at least two lines.

Check the balance

The form shows a running total of debits and credits at the bottom. A green indicator means the entry is balanced (debits equal credits). A red indicator means it is out of balance and cannot be saved.

Save or post

Click Save Draft to save the entry without posting it. You can come back and edit it later.
Click Post to post the entry directly to the general ledger (if your settings allow direct posting).

Approval workflow

If your organisation has enabled the "Require separate approver" setting (in Accounting → Settings), journal entries above the approval threshold must be submitted for approval before they can be posted.

The workflow is:

Author creates the journal and clicks Submit for Approval — status changes to "Awaiting Approval"
Approver reviews the entry and either:
- Approves & Posts — the entry is posted to the ledger
- Rejects — the entry returns to Draft for correction

Approval threshold

Only entries with a total amount above the approval threshold (set in Accounting Settings) require approval. Smaller entries can be posted directly if your settings allow it.

Viewing a journal entry

Click any entry in the list to see its full details:

Header information — Status, date, source, fiscal period
Journal lines — A table showing every line with its account code, account name, description, debit, and credit
Totals row — The total debits and credits at the bottom of the lines table
Audit trail — Who created, submitted, approved, and posted the entry, with timestamps

Reversing a journal entry

If a posted journal entry contains an error, you can reverse it rather than deleting it. Reversing creates a new journal entry with the debits and credits swapped, effectively cancelling out the original.

To reverse an entry, open it and click Reverse. The original entry is marked as "Reversed" and a link to the new reversal entry appears in the audit trail.

Reversals cannot be undone

Once a reversal is posted, both the original and the reversal remain permanently in your records. If you need to re-record the original transaction, create a new journal entry.

Automated journal entries

Many journal entries are created automatically by other parts of Helium:

Order posting — When orders are fulfilled, revenue and cost journals are created
Supplier invoices — When supplier invoices are approved, expense journals are created
Payments — When payments are recorded, cash movement journals are created
Depreciation — Fixed asset depreciation entries are generated on schedule
FX revaluation — Foreign currency balances are revalued at period end

Automated entries are marked with their source type (e.g. "Order", "Depreciation") so you can easily distinguish them from manual entries.