A journal entry, often called a voucher in Indian accounting software, is the fundamental unit of bookkeeping. It records which accounts are debited and credited, the amounts, the date and a narration. Sales, purchases, receipts and payments each create their own voucher type.
Posting a voucher updates the general ledger. Manual journal vouchers handle adjustments — depreciation, provisions, corrections — that do not arise from routine billing.
Most real entries are compound — more than two lines, still balancing in total. A credit sale of ₹10,000 with 18% GST is one voucher with three lines: the customer debited ₹11,800, sales credited ₹10,000, output GST credited ₹1,800. Month-end adjustments follow the same shape: depreciation debits the expense and credits the asset or accumulated depreciation; rent due but unpaid debits rent expense and credits a liability, so the P&L bears the cost in the right period.
Voucher types exist to keep the books navigable. Receipts and payments belong in receipt and payment vouchers so the cash and bank books stay complete; sales and purchases in their own registers; the journal voucher is reserved for non-cash adjustments. A narration on every entry — why, not just what — is the difference between books an auditor can read and books that generate queries.
The classic errors are swapping the debit and credit sides, dating an entry into a period whose returns are already filed, and passing raw journal entries against tax ledgers — adjustments to GST should trace back to prescribed documents such as invoices, credit notes or challans, not free-form journals. A useful habit is to write the narration first; if the reason cannot be stated in a line, the entry usually needs rethinking.