Keeping one set of books in USD and ZWG

One company currency, every transaction in its own

Choose the currency your books are kept in, usually USD. Every invoice, bill and payment is still recorded in the currency it happened in, together with the rate used on the day. Reports can then show both the original amount and its value in your company currency.

Rates: dated, sourced, never guessed

• Keep a dated exchange rate for each day you trade, with where it came from.
• Rates entered by hand should never be silently replaced by a feed.
• A transaction without a rate on or before its date should be refused, not assumed.
• A typed rate far from the day's rate should need a manager's approval.

Gains and losses

When a customer pays a ZWG invoice weeks later, the rate has usually moved. The difference between the rate at invoicing and the rate at payment is a realised gain or loss, and it belongs in its own account, not hidden in sales.

At month end, open balances in another currency (debtors, creditors and bank accounts) are revalued at the closing rate. That is an unrealised gain or loss, and it reverses when the balance is settled.

Cash, tills and rounding

• A till selling in both currencies should record which currency each payment came in, and give change only from cash taken.
• Small cash change is often rounded, such as to the nearest 5 cents in USD; the rounding should be recorded, not lost.
• Use one consistent rounding rule across prices, tax and payroll, and agree it with your accountant.

Payroll in two currencies

Where staff are paid partly in USD and partly in ZWG, ZIMRA's method taxes the whole salary once on the USD tables and shares the tax between the currencies. Each currency's part is paid and posted in that currency. Some choices are left to the employer and their adviser; see the payroll guide.