Doctor flagging debit entries for Expense Accounts

[nickdex]

Sometimes order is cancelled or returned and it may take few days to reflect that in bank account statements which means you have two transactions on two separate days.
For refund if we don't reduce expense amount, It may inaccurately report our spending habits.
Do you have any good suggestions how to handle this case.

[ananthakumaran]

I don't have a perfect solution for this issue. I add an Income:Refund:{name} to Asset:Checking transaction to represent the refund. But, as you said, this will not reduce the expense account amount.

As for why not just move the money from expense to asset, Paisa assumes the money moves in one direction for Income and Expenses. This is true in general accounting as well. If you check out the cashflow yearly page, the Income, and Expenses are handled differently (rolled up/down) compared to assets/liability.

I can think about adding special support for Income:Refund:{name}, Paisa already supports Income:CapitalGains:{name} convention, a similar strategy could be followed here.

[ananthakumaran]

This is something I will try to tackle for sure, but I can't say when (I don't commit to any timeline, especially for open-source projects). You can upvote the discussion, which will give some indication of how many users want this feature.

[abhishek199-dhn]

I can think about adding special support for Income:Refund:{name}, Paisa already supports Income:CapitalGains:{name} convention, a similar strategy could be followed here.

I'm currently following this convention, but it would be great if we could add a special handling for the Income:Refund account.

[ayushsoni1001]

+1

[xitij2000]

I'm considering the approach mentioned in the ledger docs here which is to use an "Assets:Reimbursements" account for reimbursements. Likewise, I'm planning to have a Reimbursements account for reimbursements, Refunds account for Refunds and Reversal account for reversals.

[Aerics84]

Had the problem today, too.
The warning confused me. AI told me i did everything correct with my refund.

2025/05/29 * PayPal ; Gutschrift Laufschuhe
; PayPal Europe S.a.r.l. et Cie S.C.A
; Brooks
Assets:Checking:ING 300,00 EUR
Expenses:Clothing

2025/05/21 * PayPal ; Laufschuhe
; PayPal Europe S.a.r.l. et Cie S.C.A
; Brooks
Assets:Checking:ING -300,00 EUR
Expenses:Clothing