Fixed assets: register, depreciation, tax book and work in progress

Every smart boards, projectors, lab equipment, computers, school buses and furniture your school owns sits in one register with its cost, depreciation and book value. Depreciation posts to your books each month, and income-tax depreciation is worked out by block beside it. A new block or a computer lab being set up gathers its cost until it becomes an asset.
PLANSScale only

The problem it solves

  • The asset register is an Excel sheet the accountant updates once a year for the audit, and nobody trusts its figures.
  • Computers, projectors and lab equipment are bought in lots, but nobody can say which room or which teacher has each one.
  • Depreciation for the books and depreciation for income tax are worked out in two sheets that never agree.
  • The cost of a new block or a computer lab being set up is spread across many bills. Nobody knows the total until the auditor asks.

How it works

  1. Your accountant sets up the asset categories once: Computers and IT, Furniture and Fittings, Plant and Machinery, Vehicles and so on. Each has its accounts, method and life. Load Country Pack makes a starting set for India.
  2. Assets come in from bills. When Make Assets from Bills is on for a category, posting a vendor bill on its asset account makes a draft asset. It makes one per unit if you ask: a bill for 40 desktops makes 40 assets.
  3. Open the draft and check the cost, the custodian and the place (a classroom, the computer lab, the science lab or the staff room). Then press Confirm. The depreciation board is worked out to the end of the asset's life.
  4. When a projector is moved to another room or a bus gets a new engine, press Change. Revaluing, impairing and changing the life go through your Asset change approval chain first.
  5. When you sell or scrap an asset, press Dispose. The entry takes the asset off the books with its gain or loss, and a sale can raise the buyer's invoice.
  6. Once a year, open Tax Depreciation, pick the year and press Work It Out to see the income-tax depreciation per block.

Everything it does

Categories

  • Kinds: Land, Buildings, Plant and Machinery, Computers and IT, Furniture and Fittings, Office Equipment, Vehicles, Tools, Software and Licences, Other
  • Accounts: asset, accumulated depreciation, depreciation expense, gain on disposal, loss on disposal, and the journal
  • Useful life: 60 months to start with; salvage as a share of cost; a yearly rate for written-down value (empty: worked out from the life)
  • Write Off Below: assets costing less, such as a chair or a lab stool, are written off in full when put to use. They are still kept in the register
  • Make Assets from Bills (off to start with) and One Asset per Unit (on to start with)
  • Post Depreciation Each Month: on to start with

Depreciation

  • Methods: Straight Line, Written-Down Value, Declining to Straight Line, Units of Use, Manual Schedule, Not Depreciated (land)
  • First period: by days from the day in use (the default) or whole first month. Or from the next month, or half a year in the first year
  • Written-down value works on each financial year's opening value, so it follows your Entity's financial year
  • Each month's line is Planned or Posted, with its journal entry. Depreciation Schedule shows every asset's lines as a list or pivot by category, year and Entity

The asset

  • Code numbered FA/year/, name, serial number, category, cost, salvage value, Bought On and In Use From
  • Custodian (a user, such as a teacher or a lab in-charge), Where (typed, such as Physics Lab or Room 12) and the analytic account
  • States: Draft, Running, Paused, Fully Depreciated, Disposed; book value always shown

Changes and disposal

  • Add Value (Improvement), Revalue, Impair, Change Remaining Life, Pause, Resume, Move / New Custodian
  • Each change is kept on the Changes tab with the date, from, to and who made it. The board is worked out again from that day
  • A paused asset stops depreciating; resuming carries on with the months that were left
  • Dispose as Sold (Sold For, the buyer, Make the Invoice: on to start with) or Scrapped. Depreciation is posted up to the day, part month by days

Tax book

  • Tax blocks or pools beside the books; the tax book posts nothing
  • Methods: block on written-down value, pool on reducing balance, per asset diminishing value, prime cost or straight rate, or none
  • India pack: blocks at 40 % (computers and software), 15 % (plant and machinery, motor cars) and 30 % (vehicles for hire). Also 10 % (furniture, buildings), 5 % (residential buildings) and 25 % (intangibles). Half the rate applies for assets used under 180 days in their first year
  • Tax Cost on an asset when it differs from the book cost; opening tax value and date for blocks or assets moved from another system
  • The report per block: opening, added (full and half rate), sale money, depreciation, closing and any gain when sales exceed the block

Work in progress

  • A project such as a new block or a computer lab being set up. It has the category it becomes, its work-in-progress account, its analytic account and a budget
  • Cost So Far adds up the posted lines on that account with that analytic account. So tag each bill line with it; over budget is flagged
  • Capitalise makes one entry from work in progress to the asset account and a draft asset with that cost, put to use today
  • Cancel only while nothing is booked to it

Who uses it

The accountant (Asset Manager)Sets up categories and tax blocks, confirms assets, makes changes, disposes of assets and runs the tax report.
The lab and IT in-charges (Asset Incharge)Read the register and where each asset is, give assets out, take them back and count them. They also need an Invoicing role to reach the menu.
Every teacher and staff member (Asset User)Sees only the assets given to them, in With me in the Campus app, staff view. They confirm what they receive there.
The principalApproves revaluations, impairments, life changes, sales and scrapping through the Asset change chain, when added as an approver.

Where you use it

  • Web: Invoicing > Fixed Assets (Fixed Assets, Depreciation Schedule, Work in Progress, Tax Depreciation, Asset Requests)
  • Web: Invoicing > Configuration > Asset Categories (Asset Categories, Tax Blocks)
  • The Campus app, staff view: Find an asset for the Asset Incharge. With me for anyone given an asset (built and in testing, not in the app stores yet)
  • Not in the app: adding or changing assets, and depreciation. Not in the parent or student apps, or on the portal
  • Not linked to the rooms you set up for classes: Where is typed on each asset
  • Not built here: assets made from stock receipts by serial number (that needs stock, which this product does not install)

What you control

Settings

  • Per category: method, useful life (60 months to start with), rate, salvage share, first period (by days to start with)
  • Per category: Write Off Below, Make Assets from Bills (off), One Asset per Unit (on), Post Depreciation Each Month (on)
  • Per tax block: rate, half rate below 180 days, first-year allowance, effective life, opening tax value
  • Asset change approval chain: the asset managers to start with, with levels you add
  • Roles: only the administrator has Asset Manager to start with, and nobody has Asset Incharge. Every staff login has Asset User by itself

Approvals

  • Asset change: revaluing, impairing, changing the remaining life, selling or scrapping an asset waits for the chain. The asset managers approve to start with; levels by amount can be added. Improvements, moves, pause and resume go through at once.

Notifications

  • Approvers of the Asset change chain get a to-do for each request waiting

Questions

We bought 40 desktops for the computer lab on one bill. Do we enter each one?

No. Turn on Make Assets from Bills on the Computers category. The bill line of 40 makes 40 draft assets at one-fortieth of the cost each. You add the serial numbers and confirm.

Does it follow Indian income-tax depreciation?

It keeps a tax book by block beside the books, with half the rate for assets used under 180 days in the first year. The India pack gives starting blocks and rates; your accountant checks them before the first tax year.

Can the principal see assets by department or room?

Group the register by Where to see each room or lab. For value by department, give each asset the department's analytic account; depreciation posts with it.

We run schools under one trust. Are the registers kept apart?

Yes. Each asset belongs to one Entity, and the Depreciation Schedule can be pivoted by Entity.

Which plan has it?

Scale. The register, depreciation, the tax book and work in progress come in that plan.

Related features

See your own school year run in it.

Tell us how many students you have, which classes you run and how you collect fees today. We will show you SmartMy School set up that way.