Rules for a supplier's bank charges

A rule is TALISK_HQ's standing answer about a supplier: the category its charges take, the sales tax it charges, and the document that proves it. You already have rules, whether or not you knew it. The first time you code a bank charge and set its sales tax, TALISK_HQ remembers that answer for that supplier, which is why the next charge arrives already coded. Ledger › Banking › Rules is where you can finally see them and correct them.

One row per supplier. Each row shows the supplier, its category, its sales tax, whether TALISK_HQ guessed the category or you chose it, and how many times it has been used. A guess is worth a second look; your own choice is not.

Change the answer and it saves itself. Pick a different category or a different sales tax and the rule updates. From then on the next charge from that supplier arrives coded that way.

It never re-codes what is already recorded. This is the important part. A rule can sit behind a year of posted entries. If changing it re-posted them, one click on a settings screen could move a sales-tax figure you had already filed, so it deliberately does not. Charges already in the books keep the coding they were posted with.

To bring a changed answer to old charges, open the row, pick one of the charges listed under Charges this rule stands behind, and use Apply to all beside that line's sales tax on Banking. That route exists because it tells you what it is about to do: it counts the charges, quotes the tax it would claim, skips anything in a closed period, and never overwrites a choice you made on a single line.

Attach the proof for a charge that never has a receipt

Every bank line in TALISK_HQ carries the same caveat: a receipt is the only proof of what a supplier actually charged. For a recurring fixed charge that is impossible to satisfy. Nobody issues a monthly receipt for storage-unit rent, and nobody ever will.

But there is a document: the agreement. Open a rule and attach the lease, the service agreement, or a screenshot of the rate clause (drop a file in, click to browse, or just paste a screenshot from your clipboard). Attached to the rule, it stands behind every charge that rule touches, which is a better answer than chasing a receipt that does not exist. That turns the rule from a convenience into the paper trail for the whole class of charges, which is exactly what an accountant or a reviewer will ask for.

Attach as many as you need. Once the first one is on, an Add another document button appears. Two reasons that matters:

• The price changed. Attach the new agreement and keep the old one: it is still the proof for the periods it covered.
• One supplier, two things. Two rental units at the same storage facility share one rule, so attach both leases.

There is no limit. Each document has its own View, Download and Remove, and removing one leaves the others alone.

Rename a document by typing over its name. Worth doing when two files arrive from a scanner both called lease.pdf, since the name is all that tells them apart in the list.

Files are stored encrypted, the same way every bill PDF and receipt image is, and nothing here touches any of the charges.

Rename a supplier

Type a new Name on the row and press Enter (or click away). This is only a label: matching is done on the bank descriptor itself, so renaming never changes which charges a rule covers.

Some rules show as Unnamed supplier. Those were created before TALISK_HQ started recording a readable name, so they have none until something touches them. Give them one here.

Clearing the name puts the automatic one back the next time the rule is used, so a name you regret is never permanent.

What you cannot do here, and why

• You cannot create a rule. One appears when you code a charge, which is what teaches it.
• You cannot delete a rule. Clearing its category and sales tax is the reversible way to stop it applying, and it keeps the history of what the rule used to say.

These are not the same as vendor rules

Both are rules about a supplier, and they match on different evidence:

• These rules match a card or bank descriptor on a statement line, like STORAGE MART #4471 VANCOUVER BC.
• Vendor rules (Ledger › Expenses › Vendor Rules) match the sender's email domain on a bill that arrives as a document, and carry the extra things a bill needs: a currency, a portal link, auto-approve.

A card descriptor has no email domain and an email has no card descriptor, so the two stay separate. Set both if a supplier reaches you both ways.