Basic Accounting Course Outline

The accounting process defined; gathering and interpreting financial information; accepted accounting principles; why accounting is 'the language of business' the three types of business entities; accounting career opportunities.

Recording the financial results of a transaction; understanding the relationships among assets, liabilities, and owner's equity; how to prepare an income statement, a statement of owner's equity, and a balance sheet.

Setting up T accounts to reflect assets, liabilities, owner's equity, revenue, and expense accounts; charting and balancing different kinds of accounts; rules of debit and credit; the double entry system; trial balances; preparing financial statements.

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Processing financial information for record-keeping; entering transactions in a general journal; the importance of the audit trail; compound journal entries; recording final entries into a general ledger; posting entries for reference; detecting and correcting errors.

Setting up a worksheet; updating accounts; depreciation; book value defined; using accumulated depreciation for expense and contra asset accounts; using the worksheet to prepare an income statement, owner's equity statement, and a balance sheet; journalizing and posting adjusting entries.

Transferring income and losses from income statement to owner's equity; journalizing and posting closing entries; interpreting financial statements; matching post-closing trial balance and income summary account.

How to record credits in a retail sales journal; daily sales journals; subsidiary ledgers; posting returns and allowances; classifying cash receipts, bank credit, credit card, and open account purchases; preparing a receivables schedule; how to compute state sales tax returns.

How to compute and account for wages, salaries, and payroll taxes; classifying and recording employee earnings and withholding; arriving at gross earnings; deductions for income, Social Security, and Medicare taxes; journalizing payroll transactions.

Recording retail purchases and payables; purchase journals and ledgers; keeping track of amounts owed to suppliers; writing purchase orders and invoices; adding net delivered cost of purchases; preparing an accounts payable schedule; effective purchase control.

Journalizing cash receipts; shortages; overages; accommodating sales discounts; internal controls for cash; writing and endorsing company checks; maintaining a business bank balance.

Four methods for determining inventory cost flow: specific identification, average cost, first-in/first-out, and last-in/last-out; estimating merchandise inventory; gross profit and retail techniques for estimating.

Techniques for adjusting accounts to accurately reflect operations; merchandise inventory adjustments; computing accrued and deferred incomes; using ten-column worksheets; expense accounts; the periodic inventory system.

Estimating and entering bad debt losses; figuring and recording losses from uncollectible receivables using direct charge-off and allowance methods; adjusting allowance for doubtful accounts.

How to prepare financial statements; classified income statements showing net sales, gross profits, and net income or loss; the classified balance sheet; current assets and liabilities; journalizing and posting adjusting entries and closing entries; the post-closing trial balance; interpreting financial statements.

Computing taxes; tax payments to the IRS; filing the required tax returns on reports; preparing an Employer's Quarterly Tax Return (Form 941); wage and tax statements (Form W-2); the annual income and tax statement (Form W-3); Workers Compensation Insurance and the Federal Unemployment Tax (Form 940).

Depreciating fixed assets (plant, property, equipment); depleting natural resources; how to classify intangible assets (patents, trademarks, brand names); amortizing intangible assets; recording asset trade-ins using fair market value.

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