Steve, Based on what I have read from other posts in a different context, you could try virtual accounts to get what you want.
But first, from what I know of 529 plans, shouldn’t you be asking the plan provider to make the payment directly to the university instead of disbursing to your account? This way, you won’t have to keep track of separate virtual accounts - whatever goes out of 529 is always into a university account towards tuition and room and board. Of course, personal deductible expenses such as books, computer, etc. may have to be disbursed to your account first and then used for qualified educational expenses. Anyway, I will assume you have a reason to do what you stated, so here’s one suggestion. Under your checking account, create a virtual sub-account (say, "529 disbursals”) as another asset. When you make a payment to the university, you move funds from your asset checking account to the virtual asset “529 disbursals” account. And from here, make a payment to an expense account setup for college. Assuming you had nothing in “529 disbursals” account when you started, this payment will make the balance go into -ve. Request for a disbursal from 529. When the money comes into your checking account, move the disbursed amount into “529 disbursals” account. This will make the virtual asset account balance come back to 0. From your perspective, whenever a -ve balance exists in the virtual sub-account, then you need to make a disbursal request. If the balance is 0, all is good. If the balance is +ve, then you have made a disbursal request larger than a qualified expense towards college (so, potentially a taxable event for you). Cheers, Deva On 25-Mar-2018, at 7:51 AM, <gnucash-user-requ...@gnucash.org<mailto:gnucash-user-requ...@gnucash.org>> <gnucash-user-requ...@gnucash.org<mailto:gnucash-user-requ...@gnucash.org>> wrote: Date: Sat, 24 Mar 2018 19:21:31 -0700 From: Steve Kelem <st...@kelem.net<mailto:st...@kelem.net>> To: Gnucash Users <gnucash-user@gnucash.org<mailto:gnucash-user@gnucash.org>> Subject: Gnucash and 529 plans Message-ID: <4b35ac7b-b424-a9db-ab5b-1062b5462...@gmail.com<mailto:4b35ac7b-b424-a9db-ab5b-1062b5462...@gmail.com>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" I have a question about recording 529-plan transactions in GnuCash. Not the basic movement of funds between checking and 529 account, as discussed 7 times in the GnuCash archives. There are two aspects of the 529 plan. The first is getting money into and out of the 529 account. Easy peesy. Already solved. The second is making sure that all of the expenditures for the 529 plan (tuition, books, room and board), are matched by a corresponding withdrawal from the 529 account. That's the part that I don't understand how to do. The payment transaction already has a source (my checking account) and a destination (the account representing how much I've paid to the university. Similarly for the 529 account disbursement. How do I keep track of whether I've requested enough disbursements? Ideally, when I pay for tuition, for example, 1. The funds go out of my checking account into the university 2. I need to make a disbursement request from my 529 plan 3. The disbursement gets deposited into my bank account. (Repeat for books, room & board...) My usual problems are remembering to make the disbursement request, and not being able to check that I don't miss a disbursement request or make a duplicate request. It would be nice if there were an account that got a copy of the tuition payment and a corresponding debit for the disbursement request. If the account balance is zero, they I'm presumably up-to-date. If the balance is positive, I need to request a disbursement. Is there such a mechanism? Thanks for any help you can give, _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list gnucash-user@gnucash.org To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user If you are using Nabble or Gmane, please see https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Mailing_Lists for more information. ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
