Core bookkeeping glossary terms for bookkeepers: general ledger, double-entry bookkeeping, trial balance, debits, credits, and the monthly close foundation.
These are the terms every other accounting conversation depends on. If a bookkeeper is reviewing a messy QuickBooks file, the first question is not "which app did this come from?" It is whether the general ledger, double-entry logic, and trial balance still tell the same story.
Start with the general ledger. It is the record every P&L, balance sheet, customer report, and bank rec pulls from. Then check : every transaction has two sides, and the accounting equation only holds when debits and credits stay paired. The is the monthly proof that the ledger still balances before the close gets handed to an owner, advisor, or tax preparer.
Growthy is built around that same review habit. It categorizes routine transactions automatically, but the bookkeeper still reviews and approves before anything matters. Clean categorization is useful only if it keeps the ledger readable, the trial balance explainable, and the month-end review fast enough to finish before lunch.
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The trial balance lists every GL account with its debit or credit balance, proving total debits equal total credits. Here's how to read it, and the troubleshooting framework for when it doesn't balance.
The general ledger is the master record of every transaction posted to every account. It feeds the trial balance, which feeds the financial statements. Here's how the GL actually works in QBO and why bookkeepers care about it.
Double-entry bookkeeping records every transaction with two equal sides (debits and credits) that must always balance.