What is Matching Concept in Accounting? Top 9 FACTs about IT

Accounting is the language of business. A good accountant understands how to use accounting principles and concepts to help businesses succeed.

But it can be hard for new accountants to learn this language, especially if they don’t have a background in finance or business. This makes it difficult for them to communicate with their clients clearly about what financial information means.

What Is Matching Concept In Accounting will teach you everything you need to know about accounting principles without getting too technical or boring, so that you can start using them right away on your own projects!

What is Matching Concept in Accounting?
What is Matching Concept in Accounting?

What Is Matching Concept in Accounting?

The matching concept is a fundamental accounting principle that can be used to determine what expenses go with what revenue and what expenses should be deferred. To understand better what the matching concept entails, it is important first to understand both what belongs on an income statement and what belongs on a balance sheet.

Accounting transactions such as buying supplies, selling goods or providing services all belong on an income statement. The matching concept represents the idea that some expenses must be put onto an income statement in the same period they create revenue. For instance, if you buy office supplies for your business but do not sell anything until next year, those sales would not be made against a current expense because you have yet to generate any revenue from them.

Therefore, the cost of supplies should be recorded as a current asset rather than a current expense. There are two primary reasons for this:

  • Expenses must match the correct time period to fit into what is known as accrual accounting, which means that transactions must be recorded at the same time they take place whether or not those expenses have been paid yet, and
  • Expenses create future revenue by creating what is known as a sunk cost. In other words, costs cannot be recovered once incurred so it does nobody any good to have an invoice sitting around unpaid until next year because then it will just become dead weight that can’t contribute to revenue. The important thing is to classify all the different types of inventory correctly in relation to what makes sense based on what might happen with those supplies. In this way, some expenses are classified as current and others as non-current because they cannot be charged to expense until some point in the future even though those costs have been incurred already.

Example of Matching Principle

For example, suppose you buy a supply of paper for your business that is predicted to last for two years before needing to be replenished. If it turns out that the supply only lasts one year, then the matching concept dictates what must happen: The cost of that inventory will either be removed from an asset account on a balance sheet or added into an expense account on an income statement assuming it’s still relevant either way.

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In fact, if more of what you bought ends up being used than was expected, your company cannot take what is known as a loss on the difference. Rather, it must either remove what would be considered obsolete inventory from an asset account or move what remains into that same asset account.

On the other hand, if what you bought lasts longer than expected, then what was once thought to be obsolete can be moved back into an asset account where it will remain until it ultimately reaches the point where you need to make another purchase of supplies or services like it next time around.

This is what makes the matching principle so important for businesses to understand: It’s not simply about what belongs on revenue and what belongs on expenses; rather, whether something ends up becoming current versus non-current depends on how much of what you bought has been consumed over what amount of time.

In short, what you have purchased must be included in the same account as what it was acquired to eventually replace or what that item will contribute to revenue in some way. In this respect, the matching concept acts as a bridge between what would normally be called an expense and what can still be counted as an asset even though it cannot generate immediate revenue from the items being purchased.

Although this might sound complicated at first glance because there are so many different types of inventory involved, once you grasp what is classified as current versus non-current within a financial statement, it becomes much easier to understand why certain expenses go with certain revenue even though they were incurred at different times during a fiscal year which has—in its own right—already passed.

What Is the Matching Principle? | Accounting Clarified

How the matching concept in accounting works

The matching principle is a way to maintain consistency across business’s income statements and balance sheets. The idea behind it, as you may have guessed from the name “matching,” is that expenses should be recorded in accordance with related revenues.

So if an expense occurs while some revenue has been earned or flow through into account – for example Change Orders on contracts where payer company A gives Contractor B permission change certain terms of agreement at his discretion; this would go onto contract C which he later modifies using those changes made by CompanyA (changing PMS license price).

The same goes for recording liabilities: they’re reported when enough time elapses after financial transactions happened.

To make sure that the company’s financial statements give an accurate view of its overall health, it is important for expenses to be recognized in a timely manner. If they are recognized too early or late then there will undoubtedly be distortions which can potentially skew how investors see and understand your business’s performance over time; this could lead them away from investing again with you down the line if things seem cloudy at best.

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What is revenue recognition?

Revenue Recognition - Principles, Criteria for Recognizing Revenues

The matching concept in accounting is an interesting blend of accrual and revenue recognition principles.

The revenue recognition principle is a core concept in accounting that businesses follow to keep accurate records. This means they have the right incentives for their employees, as well-llustrated with an example from construction work where contractors are motivated by bonuses based on how much profit they bring into the company rather than receiving payment before recording sales revenue (or any other asset).

The mantra of “what gets measured, gets managed” rings true here because without being able track your progress over time – whether financially or otherwise-you’ll never know if things are going according desired outcomes!

What Is Revenue Recognition Principle?

The revenue recognition principle is a basic accounting rule that requires businesses to record all of their income in the moment it’s earned, regardless if customers pay them promptly. For example: If you’re an electrician who has just completed work for another company but hasn’t gotten paid yet-that part of your job will still be recognized by law as “earned.”

The concept behind Accounting Principles like this one sound simple enough on paper but can often times prove more difficult when put into practice because there are so many other factors involved with making these types decisions (such as timing).

What Are the Benefits of Matching Principle?

The matching principle has a number of benefits for financial statement preparation, including:

  • Consistency across all statements; this includes the balance sheet and income statement (greater accuracy).
  • Less chance that profits will be misstated during one particular accounting period due to depreciation costs being allocated over time.

Investors want a picture-perfect income statement. One with normalized revenues and expenses, as opposed to being lumpy or disconnected from each other will show the true economics of your business more clearly for them!

In order to be an informed investor, it’s important that you look at a company’s cash flow statement in conjunction with its income statement. If for example the NPM Group reported even higher accounts payable obligations this February then there might not have been enough money on hand when making payments- so investors pay close attention and monitor these details closely!

Matching principle limitations

This idea of matching principle might not work for all businesses, as it’s important to consider the limitations. Some considerations include:

  • The timing and frequency at which transactions are recorded can have an effect on whether or not this system works well with your company’s needs.
  • If there isn’t enough information available about past transactions in order to accurately calculate future ones then cash accounting won’t produce accurate results either.

With marketing and advertising spread out over time, it’s not as effective to rely on the cause-and-effect relationship between revenue and expenses.

The best way for a business owner who want their company’s finances in order is by tracking everything they spend money on each month through things like invoices or purchase orders.

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This will give them an accurate idea of how much has been spent at any given moment so that when there are changes coming up (like if new customers sign onto your roster), then you can plan accordingly rather than reactively cutting back elsewhere just because something isn’t working well currently.

Challenges with the Matching Principle

Top 6 Factors On Matching Principle With The Challenges | Bank Reed

The principle of cause and effect is a useful tool when it’s easy to connect revenue with expenses.

This means that if you build an office space, your workers will be more productive because there are direct links between them; but sometimes these connections aren’t always so clear-cut – which can make estimating difficult! For example, consider how companies use the “useful life” (in years) or cost basis over time as another indicator for what they expect might happen in relation between two different things like buildings/space versus equipment purchases.

For example, if the office costs $10 million and is expected to last 10 years then that means a company will allocate 1M of straight-line depreciation expense per year for ten years.

The expenses will continue regardless whether revenues are generated or not – even though they can’t track when those revenue come in! Another situation where you might see this type of thing happen would be with Google AdWords where there’s no way ( realistically speaking ) to know how long it takes before customers make purchases; some might buy something months/years after seeing an advertisement while others may never purchase anything at all.


What is matching concept Class 11?

Matching concept is the most important one in accounting. It means that you have to match expenses with revenues for all your accounts during an entire year, not just some parts of it. Expenses incurred while earning these revenue must be related to same period too!

What is cost concept with example?

Under the cost concept of accounting, an asset should be recorded at its original purchase price even if it has decreased in value. This means that a building purchased for $500K would continue to appear on your books as such regardless what anyone else might say or think about how much they actually paid for something- this is because their opinion doesn’t matter when all things are taken into account and assessed based off one thing: logic!


We hope you found this article informative and we invite you to read our other blog posts on accounting. Check out some of the topics below for more information: What is a matching concept in accounting?

Following our blog about matching concepts will help you understand how important it is to create reports using these principles. It can also give your business more clarity into their finances with less guesswork! If you want some guidance through developing new reports or optimizing existing ones based on matching concepts then please contact us today! We work hard every day to make sure we’re providing helpful!

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