A chart of accounts template,
numbered and ready to import.

Revenue less cost of revenue is gross profit; less operating expenses is operating profit; then other income and other expenses give net income. That is the order a profit and loss statement reads in, and why the numbers run the way they do.

Not in the list: Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Undeposited Funds, Opening Balance Equity and Retained Earnings. ZeraBooks creates those five itself because the books need them, and they can’t be renamed or deactivated. The bank and card rows are placeholders: name them after your real accounts.

• Add an account when the total matters on its own

  If you would look at the number every month, or your tax preparer asks for it at year end, it deserves an account. Meals are a good example: tax rules treat them differently from other costs.

• Add a sub-account when you want the detail and the total

  Accounting and Legal Fees under Professional Fees show each line and still roll up to one total. In ZeraBooks a sub-account takes its parent’s type, so it can’t end up in the wrong section of the reports.

• Keep it in the memo when you only need to find it later

  Which supplier, which trip, which customer: that belongs in the description, not a new account. A chart with one account per supplier is unreadable within a year.

• Split revenue by how you earn it

  One revenue account per stream (products, services, wholesale, online) shows which one is growing. Two or three lines is plenty for most businesses.

• Deactivate instead of deleting

  When you stop using an account, deactivate it. Its history stays on past reports and nothing new can be booked to it. ZeraBooks doesn’t delete categories at all.

• Owner draws booked as expenses

  Money the owner takes out is equity, not a cost of running the business. Booking it as an expense understates profit, and the tax return built on it is wrong. It goes to Owner Draws (30200 in the template).

• Loan payments booked as expenses

  Only the interest is an expense. The rest of each payment reduces the loan balance in liabilities. A $1,250.00 payment that is $1,020.00 principal and $230.00 interest is $1,020.00 to Business Loan and $230.00 to Interest Expense.

• Too many accounts

  Two hundred accounts make reports nobody reads and give the same cost three possible homes. Most small businesses need 30 to 60; start lean and add one when a question needs it.

• Sales tax in revenue

  Tax you collect belongs to the state. It goes to Sales Tax Payable, and paying the state clears it. In revenue, it inflates sales and the payment to the state looks like an expense.

• Equipment expensed when bought

  A $4,800.00 machine you will use for years is an asset, written off through depreciation. Your tax preparer may expense it on the return; the books should still show you own it.

• Transfers booked as income

  Moving money from savings to checking, or paying the credit card, is neither income nor an expense. In ZeraBooks the category of a transfer is the other account, so it stays off the profit and loss. See Transfers, credit-card payments and owner draws.

• Online stores

  Revenue by channel, a clearing account for each platform’s payouts, merchant fees, and inventory with cost of goods sold. See bookkeeping for ecommerce.

• Nonprofits

  Revenue split into contributions, grants and program fees, with gifts tracked by donor restriction, and expenses read by program, management and fundraising. See bookkeeping for nonprofits.

• Restaurants

  Food and beverage sales apart, food and beverage cost apart, and tips and sales tax as liabilities. See bookkeeping for restaurants.

• Contractors

  Job costs laid out the way you bid them, plus retainage receivable and payable. See bookkeeping for contractors.

• Service businesses

  Often no inventory and no cost of goods sold at all. Cost of revenue holds the direct labor and subcontractors that deliver the work, or stays empty.

• Chart of accounts template (CSV)

  Forty-four numbered accounts across all eight types, with two sub-accounts already set up under their parents. Free to use; no sign-up.

• Using other software?

  The columns are plain CSV, so the file also works as a starting list for any spreadsheet. Only Category Name and Type are required by the ZeraBooks import; the rest are optional.

• Then keep it tidy

  A quick look at the chart belongs in the monthly routine: any new account, anything sitting in Uncategorized, anything booked to the wrong type. The month-end close checklist shows where it fits.