Skip to content
logo Knowledgebase

Delete old records

Created on  | Last modified on 

Summary

How to delete records in Sage 50 Accounts that you no longer use.

Description

It can be useful to occasionally remove records that you no longer use from Sage 50 Accounts. This reduces the number of old records you have to look through so you can find things more quickly. Generally, you can delete records from Sage 50 Accounts if they have no balance or transactions remaining on them. We'll show you how to do this.

TIP: If you're not ready to remove all transactions from a record, you can hide records instead by flagging them as inactive.

Resolution


Skip to:

Delete customer and supplier records

You can delete customer or supplier records if they have no remaining balance, no transactions associated with the account and are not associated with a project.

  • If the account has a balance, you must post transactions to make the account balance zero
  • If the account has associated transactions, you can remove these by backing up and running the Clear Audit Trail option. This permanently removes all fully paid, allocated and reconciled transactions up to a specific date

    NOTE: An account may have deleted transactions which must also be cleared. These don't appear on the record if the Settings > Company Preferences > Parameters > Exclude deleted transactions check box is selected.


To delete a record

  1. Open the relevant module and select the records you want to delete.
  2. Click Delete then, to confirm deletion, click Yes.

After deleting records we recommend that you take a backup and compress the relevant ledger.


Delete bank and nominal records

You must delete bank accounts from within the nominal ledger.

You can delete nominal records if they have no remaining balance, no associated transactions and they are not defined as a control account or the default cash sales bank account.

  • If the account has a balance, you must post transactions to make the account balance zero
  • If the account has associated transactions, you can remove these by backing up and running the clear audit trail option. This permanently removes all fully paid, allocated and reconciled transactions up to a specific date. An account may have deleted transactions which must also be cleared. These don't appear on the record if the Settings > Company Preferences > Parameters > Exclude deleted transactions check box is selected
  • You can't delete accounts that are defined as control accounts. Before you delete a record, check it's not listed as a control account in Settings, then Control Accounts
  • You can't delete a bank account if it's defined as the default cash sales bank account for invoices and orders

    To check this, click Settings then click Invoice and Order Defaults and click Cash Sales then click Default Cash Sales Bank Account.


To delete a record

  1. Open the relevant module and select the records you want to delete.
  2. Click Delete then, to confirm deletion, click Yes.

After deleting records we recommend that you take a backup and compress the relevant ledger.

Delete product records

Product records can be cleared if they have no remaining stock quantity, no associated transactions and are not associated with a bill of materials.

  • If the record has a quantity in stock, you must use the stock or post an adjustment to make the quantity in stock zero
  • If the record has associated transactions, you can remove these by backing up and running the option. This permanently removes all transactions that are complete, up to a specific date
  • To check if a product is associated with a bill of materials, you can run the Product Explosion report

For further information on the steps to take to check the criteria, you can view our How to delete product records guide.

To delete a record

  1. Open the relevant module and select the records you want to delete.
  2. Click Delete, then to confirm deletion, click Yes.


Next Steps

After deleting records we recommend that you take a backup and compress the relevant ledger.