Home › Ordinary Expenditure › Ordinary Expenditure

Ordinary Expenditure

. 1299. The accounts in housekeeping should be kept with great accuracy and circumstantiality, for many reasons, not the least of which is, that in most cases there are two people concerned, who sometimes may take different views of the result; and, if a reference to details cannot be given, it is extremely difficult to show that the total expenditure is correct. Besides this, unless there is an account kept against each tradesman, it is impossible to check him, and an error made either wilfully or by mistake, can neither be detected, nor remedied if surmised. No one, however, can possibly deny the advantage of keeping good accounts; and the only objection consists in the trouble they give, which will be small if the task is performed with regularity. 1300. THE BEST MODE OF KEEPING ACCOUNTS for a house is to have a daily entry book, in which every item of expenditure is put down, either opposite a printed form or otherwise. Many people use printed books in which a list is given for each day, with ruled columns; but this seems a very useless expense, as a plain ruled book is all that is necessary for the purpose. In my opinion, the weekly account should always be kept, and the daily one need not then be attempted but by putting down each item paid during the week seriatim, and then adding up the total, the week's expenses are readily arrived at. 1301. BUT, BESIDES THE WEEKLY ACCOUNT, there should be a ledger account kept, in which each tradesman should be entered under a separate head. Thus, it is well to procure a small ledger, in which the whole book is "lettered"-that is to say, it is divided into twentysix portions, each having a letter of the alphabet assigned to it, and marked on the margin. In this the manager enters under the letter B the butcher's account as it is paid, so that at the end of a month, quarter, or year, she can tell the whole outlay in that article. Bread, also, will come under the same letter. Fish will of course be posted under the letter F, and so on.