What does the fixed assets figure on the balance sheet represent?

The total of your capitalised asset accounts in the general ledger, across five named classes: fixed assets, office equipment, furniture and fixtures, vehicles, and land and buildings. It is a ledger balance rather than a sum of individual asset records.

Does AWRA OpsHub calculate depreciation?

Not as accounting depreciation. The asset register shows an indicative value trend using a single flat straight-line rate across every asset, and it is labelled indicative on screen with the rate named, because nothing posts depreciation to the ledger. A real depreciation engine with per-class rates, residual values and a monthly journal is work we can add to your workspace.

What does the operational asset register track?

Each asset by code and barcode, serial number, model and manufacturer, purchase date and cost, ownership type, warranty expiry, condition, risk level, current custodian, department, location and warehouse, plus last movement, last verification and retirement details.

Can assets be tracked as a pool rather than individually?

Yes. An asset carries a tracking mode, so items you hold in quantity can be managed as a pool with a quantity rather than as separate serialised records, with their own movement history.

Is an asset the same thing as a stock item?

They are linked but distinct. An asset can reference an inventory item, and there is a conversion path between the two, so something bought as stock can become a tracked asset when it is put into service.

Who is accountable for an asset at any moment?

The current custodian on the record, maintained by the movement flow — assignments, transfers, check-outs and returns — with a custody receipt and an expected return date where one applies.

Fixed assets

One generator. Two records, and both of them true.

Finance needs a number on the balance sheet. Operations needs to know where it is, who signed for it, whether the warranty has run out and what condition it came back in. AWRA OpsHub keeps both, tells you plainly which is which, and never quietly presents one as the other.

Start free The honest bit about depreciation

Five capitalised account classes · Full operational register · Custody & movement history · Pool or serialised tracking

Standby Generator 30kVA AST-0148

Serial: GN30-77A-2291

Class: Plant & equipment

Acquired: 14 Mar 2024 · KES 1,840,000

Ownership: Owned outright

Custodian: J. Mwangi · Facilities

Location: Industrial Area · Plant room

Condition: Good · risk: high

Warranty: Expires 14 Mar 2027

Verified: 08 Aug 2026 by A. Otieno

Requires approval to move. High-risk assets can be flagged so a transfer needs a decision rather than a click.

Why there are two

The same generator, seen from two ends of the building.

Most systems pick one of these and disappoint the other department. Keeping them separate but linked is what lets a finance figure stay a finance figure and an operational record stay useful to the person holding a spanner.

The finance view Reached from Accounting → Fixed Assets

A total per capitalised account class, built the same way as every other statement figure: the sum of the journal postings that hit those accounts. It is what feeds the fixed assets line on your balance sheet.

Five named classes, each an explicit account key rather than a name match
Every class expandable to the individual postings that produced its balance
Balances accumulated in the account's natural debit sense, consistent with the rest of the ledger
Gated behind the accounting permission ladder, so it can be granted without granting the whole ledger
Mirrored on the API alongside the other statements

The operational register Reached from Assets

One record per asset — or per pool — carrying everything a custodian, an auditor or a maintenance lead actually asks about. This is the register you walk the building with.

Identity: asset code, barcode, serial number, model, manufacturer, category
Acquisition: purchase date, purchase cost, currency, ownership type, warranty expiry
Accountability: current custodian, department, location, warehouse, expected return
State: condition, status, risk level, whether a move requires approval
History: last movement, last verification and who verified it, retirement date, reason and who retired it
Shape: a tracking mode, so things held in quantity run as a pool rather than as fake serial numbers

The two are linked rather than merged. An asset record can point at an inventory item, and there is a conversion path between the two — so a laptop bought as stock can become a tracked asset the day it is issued to somebody, without being counted twice or losing its purchase history. What the platform will not do is silently treat the operational register's purchase costs as though they were the ledger, because those are two different claims about the world and only one of them is a posting.

Capitalised classes

Five account classes roll into the fixed assets line.

You can add accounts to any of these, and a posting to any one of them lands in the fixed assets total on the balance sheet. The classes exist so a laptop and a warehouse are not the same row.

Fixed assets fixed_assets

The general capitalisation account, and the default landing place for anything not broken out below.

Office equipment office_equipment

Computers, printers, phones — the short-lived, high-churn end of the register.

Furniture & fixtures furniture_and_fixtures

Fit-out and fittings, which typically outlive the equipment and belong on their own line.

Vehicles vehicles

Separated because vehicles carry their own compliance, insurance and custody questions.

Land & buildings land_and_buildings

The long end. Kept apart from everything else because it behaves nothing like the rest.

The part most vendors blur

About that downward line on the register chart.

The asset register draws a value trend. We would rather you learned what it is from us, in advance, than worked it out from a variance later.

The value trend is indicative, and the screen says so

The chart applies a single flat straight-line rate of twenty per cent a year to every asset in the register, regardless of what the asset is. A building, a laptop and a generator all reach zero in exactly five years on that basis. There is no per-class rate, no choice of method, and no residual value.

What it is genuinely good for

Seeing the shape of a register ageing — a fleet that is mostly new looks different from one that is mostly old
Spotting a cluster of assets acquired in the same year that will need replacing together
A rough sense of scale when deciding whether a capital budget conversation is due

What we will not let it be called

Book value. It reconciles to no ledger balance and never will on this basis
A depreciation charge. Nothing posts it, so the depreciation account on your income statement reads zero
A tax computation. Capital allowances are a different calculation on different rules

So the chart is labelled indicative on screen and names its own rate, which is a deliberate choice rather than an oversight. The tempting alternative is to tighten the maths a little — add a couple of classes, guess at useful lives — and produce a number that looks authoritative and still reconciles to nothing. A more precise wrong figure is worse than an obviously rough one, because somebody will put the precise one in a board pack.

What a real depreciation engine involves is a per-class rate with a residual value and a chosen method, an effective-dated schedule, a monthly posting into the depreciation account that already exists and is already grouped on the income statement, and accumulated depreciation presented as a contra-asset beneath cost on the balance sheet. All of that is buildable on the foundations here — the register, the classes, the account group and the posting service are in place — and it is the first thing in the ledger below.

The operational life

From acquisition to retirement, with a name against every step.

A register nobody updates is a spreadsheet with extra steps. What keeps this one honest is that the movements are the same movements your teams already have to record.

Acquire Cost, date, currency and ownership type captured at the point of purchase.

Assign A custodian, department and location, with a custody receipt behind the handover.

Move Transfers, check-outs and returns — with high-risk assets able to require an approval first.

Verify Last verified date and who verified it, so an audit walk leaves a trace.

Condition Condition and status on the record, with warranty expiry visible before it matters.

Retire Retirement date, reason and the person who retired it, kept rather than deleted.

Straight answers

What the register does today — and what we can add to yours.

We have been blunt about depreciation above. Here is the whole picture in the same spirit, including what we would build.

The straight answer

What AWRA OpsHub does today

A finance view totalling five named capitalised account classes straight from the ledger, feeding the fixed assets line on your balance sheet
Every class expandable to the individual postings behind its balance
A full operational register: asset code, barcode, serial number, model, manufacturer and category
Acquisition detail — purchase date, cost, currency, ownership type and warranty expiry — on every record
Live accountability: current custodian, department, location and warehouse, with an expected return date where one applies
Condition, status and risk level, with an approval requirement that can be switched on for the assets that warrant it
A custody receipt behind handovers, and last-verified date plus verifier so an audit walk leaves a trace
Pool or serialised tracking, so items held in quantity are managed as a pool instead of given invented serial numbers
A conversion path between stock items and assets, so something bought as inventory can become a tracked asset when it goes into service
Retirement kept rather than deleted — date, reason and the person who retired it
A value trend chart labelled indicative on screen, naming its own rate, so nobody mistakes it for book value

More we can add to your workspace

A depreciation engine with per-class rates, a choice of method and residual values, posting a monthly journal into the depreciation account already waiting for it
Accumulated depreciation as a contra-asset beneath cost on the balance sheet, with net book value per class
A per-asset depreciation schedule you can open, showing the charge for each period of an asset's life
Disposal accounting — proceeds against carrying value, with the gain or loss posted on disposal
A capital allowances computation for tax, on the separate rules your jurisdiction uses
Revaluation and impairment postings on a basis your auditor specifies
A reconciliation report tying the operational register's asset costs to the capitalised ledger balances, listing any asset without a posting behind it
Automatic capitalisation from a purchase order line straight into an asset record and its account class
Maintenance scheduling against the register, with service history and cost per asset
Lease and hire-purchase accounting for assets held under agreement rather than owned
A per-class asset ageing report and a replacement-forecast view built on real useful lives

Where we point you to a specialist

The useful life and residual value of your assets are accounting judgements for you and your auditor. We will build the schedule to the rates and lives they set; we will not pick them from a template and call it policy.
Whether a cost is capitalised or expensed has tax consequences, so the decision stays with your accountant. Give us the rule and we will build the posting that follows it every time.
A valuation for insurance or for sale is a valuer's work, not a software output. We hold the cost and the history that a valuer will ask for.
Your filed accounts carry your auditor's sign-off. We hand over the register and every posting behind it and stay out of the signature block.

The depreciation engine is the item on this page customers ask for most, and it is genuinely additive rather than a rebuild — the register, the classes, the expense group and the posting service it needs are all already here. Tell us your rates, lives and method and we will come back with a written spec, a timeline and a price.

Worth saying once more plainly, because it is the thing to plan around: the depreciation account is grouped on the income statement and reads zero until something posts to it, and the register's value trend is a shape rather than a balance. Neither is hidden and neither is dressed up.

Around the register

Where assets connect.

Asset Tracking The operational module in full — movements, custodians, pools, scanning and the eight actions an asset can accept. Balance Sheet Where the capitalised total lands, beside cash, receivables and inventory. Income Statement The depreciation group that is grouped, ready and waiting for a schedule to post into it. General Ledger The postings behind every class balance, and how nothing can write one leg on its own. Proof of Handover The signature behind a custody receipt, and what happens when a signature cannot be stored. Chart of Accounts Adding an account to a capitalised class so it lands on the right statement line.

Questions, answered

Fixed asset register FAQ.

Is the fixed assets figure on my balance sheet the sum of my asset records?

No, and the distinction matters. It is the balance of your capitalised ledger accounts — what was actually posted. The operational register is a separate set of records with its own purchase costs. A reconciliation report tying the two together, and flagging any asset with no posting behind it, is work we can add.

So there is no depreciation at all?

Not as accounting depreciation, no. The account exists and is grouped on the income statement; nothing writes to it. The register's value trend uses one flat rate for every asset and is labelled indicative on screen with the rate named, precisely so it is never mistaken for book value. A real engine — per-class rates, residuals, a monthly posting — is the first thing we would build here.

Why not just make the trend a bit more accurate?

Because a more precise wrong number is more dangerous than an obviously rough one. Adding a few guessed useful lives would produce a figure that looks authoritative and still reconciles to no ledger — and somebody would eventually put it in a board pack. We would rather build the real thing to your auditor's rates.

Can I track things I hold in quantity, like fifty identical chairs?

Yes. An asset carries a tracking mode, so you can manage a pool with a quantity and its own movement history instead of creating fifty serialised records with invented serial numbers.

How do I stop a high-value asset walking out of the door?

Set a risk level and turn on the approval requirement for that asset. Its movements then need a decision rather than a click, and every movement carries the custodian, the location and a receipt.

What happens when an asset is scrapped?

It is retired rather than deleted — with the date, the reason and the person who retired it kept on the record, so the history survives the asset. Disposal accounting, posting proceeds against carrying value, is a separate piece we can add.

Can I capitalise straight from a purchase order?

Not automatically today. Receiving posts to the accounts your purchase configuration specifies, and an asset record is created in the register. Wiring a purchase order line directly into an asset record and its capitalised account class is on the list above.

Ready when you are

Know what you own, and know which number is which.

A register that tells you where the generator is and who signed for it, a ledger balance that tells you what it cost, and a straight answer about the difference between them.

Get started free Talk about a depreciation engine