Editing Bookkeeping (section)

{{Short description|Recording financial transactions or events}}
{{for|the computer programming concept|Boilerplate code}}
{{More citations needed|date=December 2013}}
{{Bookkeeping}}
{{Accounting |expanded=}}
 
[[File:Pacioli.jpg|thumb|right|250px|''Portrait of the Italian [[Luca Pacioli]]'', painted by [[Jacopo de' Barbari]], 1495, ([[Museo di Capodimonte]]). Pacioli is regarded as the Father of Accounting.]]

'''Bookkeeping''' is the recording of financial transactions, and is part of the process of [[accounting]] in [[business]] and other organizations.<ref name="Weygandt, Kieso, Kimmel (2003)">{{cite book |author=Weygandt |author2=Kieso |author3=Kimmel |title=Financial Accounting|year=2003|publisher=Susan Elbe|isbn=0-471-07241-9|pages=6}}</ref> It involves preparing source documents for all transactions, operations, and other events of a business. Transactions include purchases, sales, receipts and payments by an individual person, organization or corporation. There are several standard methods of bookkeeping, including the [[single-entry bookkeeping system|single-entry]] and [[double-entry bookkeeping system|double-entry]] bookkeeping systems. While these may be viewed as "real" bookkeeping, any process for recording financial transactions is a bookkeeping process.

The person in an organisation who is employed to perform bookkeeping functions is usually called the '''bookkeeper''' (or book-keeper). They usually write the ''[[#Daybooks|daybook]]s'' (which contain records of sales, purchases, receipts, and payments), and document each financial transaction, whether cash or credit, into the correct daybook—that is, petty cash book, suppliers ledger, customer ledger, etc.—and the [[general ledger]]. Thereafter, an accountant can create [[financial reports]] from the information recorded by the bookkeeper. The bookkeeper brings the books to the [[trial balance]] stage, from which an accountant may prepare financial reports  for the organisation, such as the [[income statement]] and [[balance sheet]].