# Ledgers and money > How Continual counts: a ledger is a running tally of entries, kept two ways, for money in double entry and for every record's status. A **ledger** keeps a running tally as **entries**, the way a bank statement keeps your balance. Each entry records one movement, and a balance is the sum of the entries so far. Entries are only ever added, so the past stays exactly as it was. ## Two kinds of ledger | Kind | What it counts | Example | | --------------- | ----------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------- | | **Financial** | Money, in double entry, kept in books | The general ledger, in Finance | | **Statistical** | Records by status: how many, how much, how long | Deals by status; tasks by status | Both work the same way, so every number in Continual, from revenue to open tasks, is a sum of entries, and opens to the records behind it. Accountants will know statistical ledgers as statistical key figures: counts kept beside the books, never mixed into them. ## Financial ledgers: double entry, plainly Every movement of money is recorded twice: where it went, and where it came from. One side is a **debit** and the other a **credit**, and they are always equal. So every entry balances, and so does the whole ledger. ### Example: invoice, then payment You issue Northstar an invoice for $1,000, and Northstar pays it a month later. | When | Account | Debit | Credit | What it says | | --------------------- | ------------------- | ------ | ------ | ---------------------------- | | You issue the invoice | Accounts receivable | $1,000 | | Northstar owes you $1,000 | | | Revenue | | $1,000 | You earned $1,000 | | Northstar pays | Bank | $1,000 | | You have $1,000 more in cash | | | Accounts receivable | | $1,000 | Northstar no longer owes it | Issuing the invoice posts the first two lines, and receiving the payment posts the next two. Nobody types these entries: each Document posts its own, in the same moment it is finalized. See [Documents](/docs/concepts/records/documents). The receivable stays an **open item** until a payment settles it, so Continual always knows what each customer still owes, invoice by invoice. ### Ledger accounts Each line names a **ledger account**, and your chart of accounts lists them all. Every ledger account is one of five types: | Type | What it tracks | Grows with a | Examples | | --------- | -------------------------- | ------------ | ------------------------------- | | Asset | What the business owns | Debit | Bank, accounts receivable | | Liability | What it owes others | Credit | Accounts payable, sales tax due | | Equity | What belongs to its owners | Credit | Owner's capital | | Revenue | What it earns | Credit | Sales, services | | Expense | What it spends | Debit | Rent, software | Some accounts are **control accounts**, such as accounts receivable. They hold what customers owe in total. Only invoices and payments post to them, each naming its customer, and a hand-entered journal entry never can. So the total always agrees with the customers behind it. ### Customer and vendor accounts A **customer account** is your relationship with one customer in Finance: which receivable account their invoices post to, and their defaults. A **vendor account** is the same for a supplier. Both name a company, so a customer who is also a vendor is one company with two accounts. ### Books A **book** keeps the ledger for one legal entity, in that entity's currency. A business with a US and a UK entity keeps two books. Each entry balances within its own book. A book has a **lock date**. Once you close a period, entries dated on or before the lock date are refused, so a late correction posts in the open period, as auditors expect. ### Foreign currency An invoice in euros posts in the book's currency too, converted at the rate on or before its date. Continual keeps both amounts. If a payment arrives when the rate has moved, the difference posts as a realized gain or loss. A rounding difference posts to the book's rounding account. ### Statements Finance reads three statements straight from the general ledger: | Statement | What it shows | | -------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- | | **Trial balance** | Every account's balance; debits and credits are equal | | **Income statement** | Revenue less expenses, for a period | | **Balance sheet** | Assets, liabilities, and equity, at a date | Nobody edits a balance by hand. To correct one, you post a [journal entry](/docs/apps/finance/journal-entries), or void or reverse the Document that posted it. **Coming:** a void nets out on the original date, while the period is open; a reversal posts on a date you choose, such as the first open day after a closed period. Coming: bills from vendors, and bank reconciliation. ## Statistical ledgers: every status, counted Every record type with a status keeps a statistical ledger, with no setup. Each time a record changes status, its ledger posts the move: one less in the old status, one more in the new. From those entries you can read, for any past date: - **How many** are in each status, such as open tasks last Monday. - **How many arrived** in a status, such as deals won this month. - **How long each stayed**, such as how long tasks spend in progress. - **How old** the records still there are, such as the age of open tasks. Each count also follows the record's other details, such as its owner, customer, or project. A deal carries its amount too, so the deal ledger also counts the pipeline in money. Statistical ledgers never balance and never touch the books. ## Two times on every entry Every entry keeps two times, as accounting keeps a document date and a posting date: - **When it counts**: the moment the movement applies, which decides its period. - **When it was recorded**: the moment Continual learned it. So you can ask "how many tickets were open on October 5", and also "what did we know about October 5 on October 6", before a late correction arrived. ## Who sees which entries You see only the entries you may read. Finance's books show only to people with a Finance role. A statistical ledger counts only the records you can see, so a private project's tasks count for its members alone. The numbers read from ledgers, and goals on them. Invoices, payments, and the general ledger. Drafts, finalizing, and corrections.