Knowledgebase  »  Volume 9 (2010)  »  Update 7

Effectively Manage Post-Dated Checks with Portfolios  

by Shankar Kaza, SAP Financials Practice Lead, Mahindra Satyam (July 2010)

Categories: Banking, Financials, General Ledger

G/L, GL

In some parts of the globe, post-dated checks and bills of exchange are the most common mode of payment from customers for the goods and services sold to them. Post-dated checks are the payments received from customers in the form of a check with a future due date for the realization of the cash proceeds. From the business side, the process steps involved from sale to realization of payment with post-dated checks are:

1. A sales invoice is raised on the customer for the value of goods and services sold to them
2. The customer makes the payment for the invoice value in the form of a check with a future date for the realization
3. Company maintains the record of all the received checks. On the specified date, the check is presented in the bank for clearance.
4. Banks collect the proceeds and send the information. Upon receiving the information, the accounting entries passed in the books of account and customer dues are cleared. 

In the whole business process from receiving the check to present and then realization, different activities are involved. In the SAP system, you can use the portfolio functionality available for the countries Greece, Turkey, and Thailand for effective tracking, control, and management of these post-dated checks. In this article, I’ll explain the step-by-step business process and the relevant configuration activities supported by screenprints for the processing of post-dated checks. For the transaction entry and processing, I am using Thailand as the example country and the transaction codes available as part of the area menu SAP_ICC_THAILAND.

A portfolio is a collection or group of checks. Storing checks in portfolios makes it easier to manage. In the SAP system, you enter the details for checks when received and process them when they become due. Portfolios are defined for a company code in the customization based on the requirement. (Refer to the IMG step 4 in the configuration section of this article.) For this example, I have defined two portfolios, one for posting the receipt of post-dated checks (ZBKC_PDC_R) and the other to capture the details for bounced or returned checks (ZBKC_PDC-B). Based on your requirements and reporting, you can configure different portfolios. You need to define the special general ledger indicators separately for each portfolio and assign the alternative reconciliation accounts. 

The functionality I’m using, the Bank Accounting submodule of FI, applies to both SAP R/3 and SAP ERP Central Component (SAP ECC) 5.0 and 6.0 systems.

Copyright © 2010 Wellesley Information Services. All rights reserved. Email: customer.service@financialsexpertonline.com.
Financials Expert, 20 Carematrix Drive, Dedham, MA 02026, USA.
Sales and Customer Service: 1-781-751-8799
SAP and the SAP logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and several other countries.