A trial balance is a list of all the general ledger accounts contained in the ledger of a business. This list will contain the name of each nominal ledger account and the value of that nominal ledger balance. Each nominal ledger account will hold either a debit balance or a credit balance.

What is the purpose of the trial balance?

Essentially, recording a trial balance is the first step when preparing official financial statements. It’s a work in progress to verify your credits and debits. The trial balance is primarily used as part of the double entry accounting system. By checking that your debits and credits are equal, you can pick up on any mathematical errors. Total debits should equal total credits for the trial balance to be correct. If there are any discrepancies in the totals, you can investigate these problems before they’re recorded on the official financial statements.

Go to Financial Accounting > Reports > Trial Balance. As shown below.

The below Trial Balance screen will then open. You can search by selecting one of the following three options circled below and by date 📅.

Add your date and click search, as shown below.

The below screen will then appear and there is your Trial Balance report. You can export this report to excel for your own use.