When entering Vendor Invoices, we enter the Vendor Document Date based on the actual date printed on the Vendors Invoice. We do this so that the Due Date of the Invoice will be accurately calculated based on our terms with each Vendor. When we receive product we issue the Receipt immediately into POA. Later (sometimes a week or two) we receive the invoice. When we enter the Vendor Document date it is often prior to the Receipt date. For example the Receipt may have been entered on Sept 2 and the Invoice arrives on Sept 8 but is dated Aug 27. When we enter the Invoice on Sept 8 in POA we change the Vendor Document Date to Aug 27, which also changes the Document Date on the first screen to Aug 27, ultimately posting the Invoice into August. The Vendor terms (i.e. Net 30) are calculated correctly by doing this, however, it would be much better (in my humble opinion) if the Vendor Document Date was used only to determine the Due Date of the Invoice and not change the actual Document Date (posting date). The posting date should be the date it was posted (i.e. Sept 8).

It took me a long time to figure out why our Accounts Payable Clearing Account was showing a Negative amount on our Balance Sheet at the end of each month. That account should only be receipts that have been added to inventory but haven't been entered as Invoices yet. Accounts Payable Clearing Account should therefore always be a positive amount on the balance sheet and can be easily added to the Payable amount for a Payable total. Back dating our Invoices is skewing our month end numbers.

Is keeping the Vendor Document Date as "today" and overriding the terms and manually entering the true Due Date our best option? Or is there some way to disconnect the Vendor Document Date from changing our Posting Date?