AWRA Help Center

Open Accounting → Journal, then Petty Cash in the accounting sidebar. You can also reach it from the Accounting quick actions. Every float lists its custodian, its level, its balance, what is available to pay, and what it needs to top up.

The Balance Is The Ledger

Creating a float creates a dedicated asset account in your chart of accounts, named Petty Cash — <float name>. The float’s balance is that account’s balance, read straight from the journal. There is no second running total kept beside it, so the box and the books cannot drift apart.

• Balance — what the account holds.
• Available — the balance less any payments still waiting for approval, so two vouchers cannot spend the same money.
• To top up — the float level less the balance. Topping up by exactly this amount restores the float.

Setting Up A Float

1. Choose New float and give it a name (for example, Front Office).
2. Enter the float level — what the box is topped back up to.
3. Optionally pick a custodian (the person who holds the box), a branch (warehouse) and a currency.
4. To fund it straight away, enter an opening top-up and the bank or cash account it came from. That first top-up posts immediately, without waiting for approval, so the box can pay its first voucher.

Recording Vouchers

Open a float and record a voucher. Each voucher gets its own number and is one of two kinds:

• Payment out of the box — give the date, payee, description, amount and the expense account it was spent on. Attach a photo or PDF of the receipt (PDF, JPG, PNG, WEBP or HEIC, up to 10 MB). You can tag it to a department and a project.
• Top-up into the box — money put in, with the bank or cash account it came from.

Receipts are stored privately and open only for people allowed to view petty cash.

Approval

Approval is a switch in Settings → Accounting Defaults and is off by default, because a one-person office has nobody else to approve. With it on, every new voucher waits as pending and nothing posts until it is approved. Two rules hold:

• The person who recorded a voucher cannot approve it. Somebody else with the approve permission has to.
• A pending payment already counts against what the box has available, so the float cannot be overspent while vouchers queue.

A rejected voucher keeps its reason and posts nothing.

What Posts To The Ledger

• Payment: debit the expense account, credit the float’s account.
• Top-up: debit the float’s account, credit the bank or cash account it came from.
• Each entry carries the voucher’s department and project tags and the float’s branch, so petty spending shows up correctly on a department or branch income statement.

A voucher dated in a closed month is refused; date it in an open month. If a voucher was dated in an open month but that month was closed while it waited for approval, the approval still goes through and the entry lands on the first open day instead.

Paying An Advance From The Box

When a staff advance is issued from a petty cash float, it appears on that float as a payment voucher. The box’s own list then explains where the money went, and an advance larger than what the box has available is refused. See Staff Advances.

Permissions

• View petty cash — see floats, vouchers and receipts.
• Manage petty cash — create floats and record vouchers.
• Approve petty cash — approve or reject pending vouchers.

Common Mistakes

• Moving money between boxes as a payment. A payment must go to an expense account. To move cash to another float or back to the bank, record a top-up on the receiving account instead.
• Topping a float up from itself. This is refused — choose the bank or cash account the money actually came from.
• Paying more than is available. The voucher is refused with the amount the box still holds. Top it up first.
• Using Expenses for till-drawer spending. Expenses are for bills owed or paid from the bank; small cash from a box belongs here. See Expenses.

Related

• Staff Advances — cash given to a named person, cleared by receipts.
• Month-End Close — closing a period and what it locks.
• Chart of Accounts — where each float’s account appears.
• Petty cash and staff advances — the feature overview.