Immutable Ledger

Immutable Ledger

Introduced in Version 13

From ERPNext version 13 onward, a significant change has been implemented. This alters the functionality of ERPNext's Accounting Ledger (General Ledger) and Stock Ledger. There are a variety of reasons why ledgers must be immutable. To mention a few:

1.Reposting future entries is expensive computationally. To post a retroactive transaction, all subsequent entries must be reposted.

2.In the Stock Ledger, where valuations are based on the First-in-first-out (FIFO) method, the entire sequence can be regenerated, which can disrupt valuations and profit for subsequent transactions.

3.Additionally, taxes paid for a period may be altered.

Following are the impacts on day to day transactions

1. Reverse Entries on cancellation of transactions

On cancellation of any transaction, rather than deleting the GL Entries for that transaction, reverse entries will be passed to cancel the effect of that transaction as of the date of cancellation.

Since GL Entries linked to a transaction will never be deleted this also means that cancelled transactions and their linked documents can no longer be deleted.

2. Restriction on posting backdated stock entries

Since the ledgers are now immutable, future transactions cannot be modified or posted. So users will no longer be able to post stock transactions with retroactive dates.

For example, if a Stock Transaction for Item A with posting time 19-06-2020 23:00:10 has already been posted, you cannot post another Stock Transaction for Item A with posting time prior to this timestamp.