Understanding the chart of accounts
The chart of accounts is the backbone of Ustawi's general ledger — the structured list of accounts every journal posts into. Because the platform runs a real double-entry ledger rather than a summary report, the accounts you define here are what a disbursement, a repayment or a provision entry actually lands in.
How the accounts are structured
Accounts are grouped by type — assets, liabilities, equity, income and expenses — and each account carries the classification the ledger needs to post correctly. A loan portfolio account is an asset; a client savings or insurance-premium liability is a liability; interest and fee income sit under income. The type determines whether an account normally carries a debit or credit balance, which is what lets the trial balance prove itself.
Why classification matters
Each account also carries a VAT treatment tag, so interest income and fee income can be classified separately at the chart-of-accounts level. This is what makes exempt-versus-taxable treatment correct by construction rather than a manual adjustment at filing time — see the VAT treatment article for the detail.
Accounts the apps post into automatically
- Loans receivable — the outstanding principal asset, moved by disbursements and repayments.
- Interest income and fee income — credited as the loan accrues and charges, tagged for their VAT treatment.
- Loan-loss provision / reserve — where provisioning and write-off entries post.
- Insurance premium liability — where a bundled premium lands, never as income.
Most entries into these accounts are automatic postings driven by app events. The chart of accounts is where you define and map them once, not where you type daily transactions — that is what keeps the books consistent.