The General Ledger
A ledger is a group of accounts. The general ledger contains all of the accounts that are needed to prepare finanacial statements.
Accounts Payable/Receivable Ledgers
An accounts payable ledger is a type of subsidary ledger. In an accounts payable ledger, the only items recorded are accounts for vendors who bought or purchased on account. An accounts receivable ledger is also a type of subsidary ledger. Only in the accounts receivable ledger the only thing recorded is accounts for charge customers.
Posting
Posting is a process that happens after a transaction has been recorded. Some companies will post at the end of every month and some may wait a full year before they post. Each transaction is posted in a certain ledger. For example, anything that was charged to cash will be posted in the cash ledger account. When you go to post a transaction you must first look at the transaction and decide what ledger it belongs to. If you're posting cash, you will take the date and the amount of cash and record it in the general ledger under the cash category. (see figure 3.)
