Posting

Posting is the process of transferring journal entries to the individual ledger accounts. A typical ledger follows a standard format that includes

• dates
• transaction numbers and
• debit/credit amounts transferred from the general journal.

When we talk about posting, we're talking about the process of simply taking the journal entries that we just prepared and placing them into the individual ledger accounts. Each account, whether it's an asset, liability, or owner's equity account, will be kept track of in T accounts. As a reminder debits are on the left and credits are on the right. The first thing we'll list is the transaction number from the general journal in parentheses, and then the amount that was debited or credited.

If we look at the cash ledger account in our example, the first journal entry involves this account. So we will put a one in parentheses, then the debit amount of $100,000. After all the transactions are posted, then we will tabulate the amounts to get the balances of each account, which will be used for the next step in the process.

Cash 101

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(1)	$100,000	$ 2,400	(2)
(7)	2,000	10,000	(3)
(9)	5,000	20,000	(5)
(10)	10,000	2,000	(8)
-	-	500	(11)
-	$82,100	-	-

Accounts Receivable 102

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(6)	$10,000	$2,000	(7)
-	$8,000	-	-

Supplies 103

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(4)	$4,000	-	-
-	$4,000	-	-

Prepaid Insurance 105

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(2)	$2,400	-	-
-	$2,400	-	-

Truck 111

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(5)	$20,000	-	-
-	$20,000	-	-

Equipment 112

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(3)	$50,000	-	-
-	$50,000	-	-

Accounts Payable 201

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(8)	$2,000	$4,000	(4)
-	-	$2,000	-

Notes Payable 202

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
-	-	$40,000	(3)
-	-	$40,000	-

Unearned Revenue 204

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
-	-	$10,000	(10)
-	-	$10,000	-

Common Stock 301

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
-	-	$100,000	(1)
-	-	$100,000	-

Revenue 331

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
-	-	$10,000	(6)
-	-	5,000	(9)
-	-	$15,000	-

Utilities Expense 345

debit transaction number	DR	CR	credit transaction number
(11)	$500	-	-
-	$500	-	-