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lient: In commercial, organizational and technical terms, a self-contained unit in an R/3 System

with separate master records and its own set of tables.

Company Code: The smallest organizational unit of Financial Accounting for which a complete

self-contained set of accounts can be drawn up for purposes of external reporting.

Business Area: An organizational unit of financial accounting that represents a separate area of

operations or responsibilities within an organization and to which value changes recorded in

Financial Accounting can be allocated.

Enterprise structure:A portrayal of an enterprises hierarchy. Logical enterprise structure,including the organizational units required to manage the SAP System such as plant or cost

center. Social enterprise structure, description of the way in which an enterprise is organized, in

divisions or user departments.The HR application component portrays the social structure of an

enterprise

Fiscal year variant: A variant defining the relationship between the calendar and fiscal year.The fiscal year variant specifies the number of periods and special periods in a fiscal year andhow the SAP System is to determine the assigned posting periods.

Fiscal Year: A period of usually 12 months, for which the company produces financialstatements and takes inventory.

Annual displacement/Year shift: For the individual posting periods various entries may be

necessary. For example, in the first six periods the fiscal year and calendar year may coincide,whereas for the remaining periods there may be a displacement of +1.

Chart of Accounts: Systematically organized list of all the G/L account master records that are

required in a company codes. The COA contains the account number, the account name andcontrol information for G/L account master record.

Financial statement version: A hierarchical positioning of G/L accounts. This positioning can

be based on specific legal requirements for creating financial statements. It can also be a self-

defined order.

Account group: An object that attributes that determine the creation of master records. The

account group determines: The data that is relevant for the master record A number range fromwhich numbers are selected for the master records.

Field status group: Field status groups control the additional account assignments and otherfields that can be posted at the line item level for a G/L account.

Posting Key: A two-digit numerical key that determines the way line items are posted. This keydetermines several factors including the: Account type, Type of posting (debit or credit),Layout

of entry screens .

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Functional area: An organizational unit in Accounting that classifies the expenses of an

organization by functions such as:

Administration

Sales and distribution

Marketing

Production Research and developmentClassification takes place to meet the needs of cost-of-sales accounting.

Noted item: A special item that does not affect any account balance. When you post a noted

item, a document is generated. The item can be displayed using the line item display. Certainnoted items are processed by the payment program or dunning programfor example, down

payment requests.

Accrual and deferral:The assignment of an organizations receipts and expenditure to

particular periods, for purposes of calculating the net income for a specific period.A distinction is made between:

Accruals -

An accrual is any expenditure before the closing key date that represents an expense for anyperiod after this date.

Deferral -

Deferred income is any receipts before the closing key date that represent revenue for any period

after this date.

Statistical posting: The posting of a special G/L transaction where the offsetting entry is made

to a specified clearing account automatically (for example, received guarantees of payment).

Statistical postings create statistical line items only.

Valuation area: An organizational unit in Logistics subdividing an enterprise for the purpose of

uniform and complete valuation of material stocks.

Chart of depreciation: An object that contains the defined depreciation areas.It also contains

the rules for the evaluation of assets that are valid in a specific country or economic area. Eachcompany code is allocated to one chart of depreciation. Several company codes can work with

the same chart of depreciation.The chart of depreciation and the chart of accounts are completely

independent of one another.

Asset class: The main criterion for classifying fixed assets according to legal and management

requirements.

For each asset class, control parameters and default values can be defined for depreciationcalculation and other master data.

Each asset master record must be assigned to one asset class.

Special asset classes are, for example:

Assets under construction Low-value assets

Leased assets

Financial assets

Technical assets

Depreciation area: An area showing the valuation of a fixed asset for a particular purpose (for

example, for individual financial statements, balance sheets for tax purposes, or management

accounting values).

Depreciation key: A key for calculating depreciation amounts.

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The depreciation key controls the following for each asset and for each depreciation area:

Automatic calculation of planned depreciation

Automatic calculation of interest

Maximum percentages for manual depreciation

The depreciation key is defined by specifying:

Calculation methods for ordinary and special depreciation, for interest and for the cutoff value Various control parameters

Period control method: A system object that controls what assumptions the system makes when

revaluating asset transactions that are posted partway through a period.

Using the period control method, for example, you can instruct the system only to startrevaluating asset acquisitions in the first full month after their acquisition.

The period control method allows different sets of rules for different types of asset transactions,

for example, acquisitions and transfers.

Depreciation base: The base value for calculating periodic depreciation.The following base values are possible, for example:

Acquisition and production costs

Net book value Replacement value