IAC Accounting Data Model: A Better Data Structure for Computerized Accounting Systems

Abstract

It is said that accounting is the heart of all Enterprise Resource Planning Systems (ERP). This metaphor reminds us that accounting is the center and summarization of all business information and essential to manage the business. However, this analogy is also misleading because the heart is an independent organ that pumps blood to the whole body while accounting is (1) dependent on the subsystems-auxiliary ledgers and (2) the data it process comes from those subsystems. This paper shows how accounting data is summary data that repeats the data contained in the other subsystems; a repetition required in a manual information system but redundant and unnecessary in a computerized one. Subsequently it shows how part of the data contained in the subsystems is in itself also redundant. It concludes with an accounting data model (IAC) that provides a better data structure for computerized accounting information systems.

Keywords: Accounting, accounting information systems, ERP, data structures, databases

JEL Classification: M41, L86