Beancount for Kitty, simple model

TL;DR

A simple model of a kitty for Beancount.

After laying down the needs in Looking at Beancount, I went for a direct mapping of the different accounts, setting most of them as Assets and the External one as an Equity:

2021-01-01 open Assets:Common   EUR
2021-01-01 open Assets:Alice    EUR
2021-01-01 open Assets:Bob      EUR
2021-01-01 open Assets:Carol    EUR
2021-01-01 open Equity:External EUR

Now, let’s recap the first transactions, where the three participants do a wire transfer to the common account:

 1. External --> Common:   100 EUR
 2. Common   --> Alice:    100 EUR 
 3. External --> Common:    90 EUR
 4. External --> Common:   120 EUR
 5. Common   --> Bob:       90 EUR
 6. Common   --> Carol:    120 EUR

Their mapping to Beancount is straightforward:

2021-01-01 * "wire transfer from Alice, from the bank"
   Assets:Common   100 EUR
   Equity:External

2021-01-01 * "attribution to Alice"
   Assets:Alice  100 EUR
   Assets:Common

2021-01-02 * "wire transfer from Bob, from the bank"
   Assets:Common   90 EUR
   Equity:External

2021-01-02 * "wire transfer from Carol, from the bank"
   Assets:Common   120 EUR
   Equity:External

2021-01-03 * "attribution to Bob"
   Assets:Bob    90 EUR
   Assets:Common

2021-01-03 * "attribution to Carol"
   Assets:Carol  120 EUR
   Assets:Common

Now the expenses directly from the common account:

 7. Common   --> External:  60 EUR
 8. Alice    --> Common:    20 EUR
 9. Bob      --> Common:    20 EUR
10. Carol    --> Common:    20 EUR

These can be represented with two records, one related to what comes from the bank statement, the other one for the splitting:

2021-01-20 * "buying something for the group, via the bank"
   Assets:Common -60 EUR
   Equity:External

2021-01-20 * "splitting the expense"
   Assets:Alice  -20 EUR
   Assets:Bob    -20 EUR
   Assets:Carol  -20 EUR
   Assets:Common

Last the direct expense from Alice (let’s stick to the simpler model):

11. Common --> Alice:  30 EUR
12. Alice  --> Common: 10 EUR
13. Bob    --> Common: 10 EUR
14. Carol  --> Common: 10 EUR

This can be addressed in one single recording:

2021-01-27 * "Alice buying something directly"
   Assets:Alice  30 EUR
   Assets:Alice -10 EUR
   Assets:Bob   -10 EUR
   Assets:Carol -10 EUR

So… let’s see how it goes:

$ bean-report example.bc balances
Assets:Alice       100 EUR
Assets:Bob          60 EUR
Assets:Carol        90 EUR
Assets:Common   
Equity:External   -250 EUR
Expenses        
Income          
Liabilities

It’s working, which is fair. I’m not sure it’s the best way to model the whole thing… but it’s surely one!


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