What Are Adjusting Entries?
By Rachel Blakely-Gray on May 29, 2018
Having accurate accounting books is essential for making financial decisions, securing financing,
and drafting financial statements. But sometimes, you find gaps in your records, either from
making mistakes or carrying out transactions from one accounting period to another.
To combat discrepancies and get your records in order, you need to create adjusting entries.
What are adjusting entries?
What are adjusting entries?
Adjusting entries are journal entries used to recognize income or expenses that occurred but are
not accurately displayed in your records.
You create adjusting journal entries at the end of an accounting period to balance your debits and
credits. They ensure your books are accurate so you can create financial statements.
In accrual accounting, you report transactions when your business incurs them, not when you
physically spend or receive money. Adjusting journal entries are required to record transactions
in the right accounting period.
You can create adjusting entries to record depreciation and amortization, an allowance for
doubtful accounts, accrued revenue or expenses, and adjustments necessary after bank statement
reconciliations.
Adjusting entries fall under one of three categories:
1. Accruals: Revenues or expenses that have not been recorded, and have not been received
or paid (e.g., accrued revenues and accrued expenses)
2. Deferrals: Revenues or expenses that have been recorded but not yet earned or used
(e.g., prepaid expenses and unearned revenues)
3. Estimates: Non-cash items (e.g., allowance for doubtful accounts)
Adjusting entries can also refer to entries you need to make because you simply made a mistake
in your general ledger. If your numbers don’t add up, refer back to your general ledger to
determine where the mistake is. Then, create an adjusting entry to reverse or alter the record.
Creating adjusting entries is one of the steps in the accounting cycle. It occurs after you prepare a
trial balance, which is an accounting report to determine whether your debits and credits are
equal. If the debits and credits in your trial balance are unequal, you must create accounting
adjustments to fix the discrepancy.
How to do adjusting entries
Prepare adjusting entries like you would any entry in accrual accounting: debit one account and
credit another account.
Some accounts are increased by debits while others are increased by credits. Take a look at the
following chart to help you:
Adjusting entries deal mainly with revenue and expenses. When you need to increase a revenue
account, credit it. And when you need to decrease a revenue account, debit it. Oppositely, debit
an expense account to increase it, and credit an expense account to decrease it.
Adjusting entries examples
Take a look at these three adjusting entries examples and solutions to further clarify the topic.
Example #1: Accruals
Let’s say you operate a lawn mowing service. You mowed a customer’s lawn in one accounting
period, but you will not bill the customer until the following accounting period. You performed a
service worth $1,000.
Even though you won’t bill the customer until the following period, you still need to record the
amount of your service in your books.
To record the amount of your services performed in one accounting period, you need to create
the following adjusting entry. Debit your accounts receivable account and credit your service
revenues account.
Date Account Notes Debit Credit
Accounts Receivable
6/30/2018 Lawn services 1,000
Service Revenues 1,000
Creating this adjusting entry will increase the amount of your accounts receivable account in
your books.
Example #2: Deferrals
You run a jelly of the month subscription business. A customer pays you $300 for a 12-month
supply of jelly. Because the customer pays you before they receive all their jelly, not all the
revenue is earned. Instead, it is deferred revenue. However, your cash account increases because
your business receives more cash.
Date Account Notes Debit Credit
Cash Payment for jelly
1/1/2018 300
Deferred Revenue subscription 300
Each month, one-twelfth of the deferred revenue becomes earned revenue, which works out to
$25 per month ($300 / 12). Create an adjusting entry to decrease your deferred revenue account
by debiting it, and increase your revenue account by crediting it.
Date Account Notes Debit Credit
Deferred Revenue One month of jelly
1/15/2018 25
Revenue subscription 25
Example #3: Estimates
You set up an allowance for doubtful accounts. An allowance for doubtful accounts is a contra-
asset account that decreases your accounts receivable. It estimates that some of your customers
won’t pay you.
Let’s say you predict that you won’t receive $800 of your receivables. Because a debit increases
expenses, you must debit your bad debts expense account. Take a look at your adjusting entry:
Date Account Notes Debit Credit
Bad Debts Expense
Estimated default
1/5/2018 Allowance for 800
payments 800
Doubtful Accounts
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