Accounting is an information system, which can be either a manual accounting information system (HAIS) or a computer-based accounting information system (CAIS). CAIS is an information management system (MIS), which uses computers to collect, process, store, transmit and output a lot of useful information. Replacing HAIS with CAIS is not only the improvement of accounting methods, but also the improvement and modernization of accounting management. This paper intends to compare the connection and difference between the two, and expounds the practical significance of the comparison.

First of all, the connection between CAIS and HAIS

1, the system objectives are consistent. Both of them record and account for the economic business of enterprises, and their ultimate purpose is to strengthen management, provide accounting information, participate in business decisions and improve the economic benefits of enterprises.

2. The basic accounting theories and methods adopted are consistent. Both systems should follow the basic accounting theories and methods, and both adopt the double-entry bookkeeping principle.

3. Everyone should abide by the accounting and financial system and the national financial laws and regulations, strictly abide by the laws and regulations implemented in implementation of accounting, plug all possible loopholes in measures, technologies and systems, eliminate malpractices and prevent cheating.

4. The basic functions of the system are the same. Any information should have five functions: information acquisition, input, storage, processing, transmission and output.

5. Keep accounting files. As the output of accounting information system, accounting information files must be properly kept and easy to query.

6. The requirements for preparing accounting statements are the same. Both systems should prepare accounting statements, and both should prepare external statements of enterprises according to national requirements.

Second, the difference between CAIS and HAIS.

1. There are differences in system initialization settings. The initialization of HAIS includes establishing accounting subjects, opening general ledger and registering balances. The initial setting of CAIS is complicated and difficult, and its contents mainly include the installation of accounting system, the setting of account set, the setting of network users' authority, the setting of operator and authority, the setting of software operating environment, the setting of account level and bit length, the setting of account and its code, the input of initial balance of the most detailed account, the setting of voucher type, the definition of automatic transfer entry, the definition of accounting report name, format and data source formula, etc.

2. There are differences in parallel billing. When HAIS is recorded, one accountant records it in the general ledger according to the verified accounting voucher, account summary or summary accounting voucher, and another accountant records it in the subsidiary ledger in parallel according to the original voucher or accounting voucher, and checks whether it is equal at the end of the month. Because two accountants may make mistakes when logging in, parallel billing can check for errors. In CAIS, the data of general ledger and subsidiary ledger are all from original vouchers or bookkeeping vouchers. The computer transmits the data in the accounting voucher database to the general ledger database and the subsidiary ledger database according to the program command of logging in the general ledger and subsidiary ledger. There is no possibility of data operation error in the internal operation of the computer, so the general ledger amount is always equal to the subsidiary ledger amount in CAIS. Therefore, the verification function of parallel billing has lost its original function in CAIS.

3. There are differences in the setting and use of subjects. In HAIS, due to the limitation of manual accounting, accounts are divided into general ledger and subsidiary ledger, and most subsidiary ledgers are only set as tertiary accounts. In addition, an auxiliary account is opened to meet the needs of management accounting. The setting and use of subjects are generally only Chinese subjects. In CAIS, the computer can handle all kinds of complicated work, and the setting of the series and bit length of subjects varies with different software. Some financial software can set up more than 6 courses, which fully meets the needs of detailed accounting. In addition to setting Chinese subjects, it is necessary to set the subject code corresponding to Chinese subjects. When using subjects, the computer only requires users to input a certain subject code, but not Chinese subjects. However, when displaying and printing, Chinese subjects and corresponding subject codes are generally displayed at the same time.

4. There are differences in accounting procedures. According to the different production scale, operation mode and management form, HAIS adopts different accounting forms. Commonly used accounting procedures include bookkeeping voucher bookkeeping table, account summary bookkeeping table, summary bookkeeping voucher bookkeeping table, journal bookkeeping table, etc. Business data are collected, processed and registered repeatedly in a decentralized way, and internal containment and mutual check are carried out through multiple personnel and links, with the aim of simplifying accounting procedures and reducing fraud and errors. In CAIS, it is generally determined according to the file settings. Commonly used are journal file accounting table and voucher file accounting table. In computer accounting system, usually only one accounting form is used to collect, process and share data.

5. Journal and subsidiary ledger have different functions. In HAIS, journals are usually set only for cash and bank deposits, so as to record the occurrence of monetary funds in time, so as to realize daily settlement with monetary funds and clear monetary accounts. Voucher information is scattered, so it is not convenient to query. The subsidiary ledger is only set to facilitate the query of vouchers. It is time-consuming and error-prone to log in the subsidiary ledger according to the voucher information. In CAIS, although any subject can have journal entries and sub-ledgers, all data in journals and sub-ledgers come from accounting vouchers. As an efficient tool, computer provides various query conditions for accounting vouchers in accounting software, such as date, voucher number, subject code, abstract, company name, voucher number, operator, auditor, debit amount, credit amount, income, etc. There are four query methods: explicit query, free query, combined query and fuzzy query, which can query all business information of an enterprise. From this point of view, the significance of subsidiary ledger in CAIS is no longer important and can be cancelled. According to the regulations of the Ministry of Finance, the subsidiary ledger can be output once a year, just for the need of archiving.

6. There are differences in account book formats. In HAIS, account book formats can be divided into three types: customized account book, loose-leaf account book and card account book, and customized account book must be used in cash book, deposit journal and general ledger. However, in the computer accounting system, due to the limitations of the printer, it is impossible to print customized account books. Therefore, according to the Accounting Computerization Standard, all account pages can be printed in loose-leaf form and bound into volumes; The format of the general ledger account page includes the traditional three-column debit-credit general ledger and account summary general ledger, which can replace the former; The format of subsidiary ledger can be three-column, multi-column and quantity-amount.

7. There are differences in bookkeeping rules. Errors in HAIS account records should be corrected by cross correction or red correction; Blank lines and blank pages in the account page should be crossed out with red lines. In CAIS, there is no paper account book, and all data are stored in the machine in the form of files. Posting is just an old term, and files are not necessarily set according to journals, general ledgers and sub-ledgers. Some systems even set up only one voucher file, and there is no internal journal, general ledger and subsidiary ledger at all. Various financial information can be directly exported from the voucher file, and the underline is correct or red. In fact, as long as the voucher is entered correctly, the machine processing is accurate. Even if the voucher data is wrong or changed, and the internal account result is wrong, it cannot be modified directly, and can only be corrected through accounting vouchers.

8. Accounting

9. Can accounting develop?

There are differences in personnel, organizational system, internal control mode, operating tools and information storage media. In HAIS, all staff are accounting professionals; According to the needs of accounting affairs, the organization system is divided into different professional groups, and the data is ensured to be correct through internal controls such as consistency of accounts and certificates, consistency of accounts and consistency of accounts and facts; Abacus and calculator are mainly used as calculation tools; The information storage medium takes paper data as the carrier, which occupies a large space and is cumbersome to query. In CAIS, there are not only accounting professionals, but also computer software and hardware technicians and operators; According to the needs of the system, the organization system can be divided into computer supervisor, software operation, audit and accounting, system maintenance, computer review, data analysis and other professional groups. Internal control extends to personnel, computer equipment, data and procedures, and its requirements will be more stringent; The computing tool is a computer; The information storage medium is made of magnetic material (usually magnetic disk), which occupies small space and is convenient for query and retrieval.

Third, the practical significance of the comparison between CAIS and HAIS

From the above comparison, we can see that CAIS and HAIS have many similarities and obvious differences. These differences make us pay attention to the following aspects in the process of establishing CAIS:

1, pay attention to system initialization. Evaluating the quality of a CAIS can be judged according to the final result of system processing, that is, whether the data of account books and accounting statements are accurate and whether the process control is effective. When the program and control of the financial software itself are normal and reliable, the correctness of the data output results is directly related to the initial setup of the system. Therefore, in the initial setting of the system, the series and bit length of accounting subjects should be set correctly according to the needs of enterprise accounting, and a standardized accounting code system should be established; Carefully sort out and enter the balance at the beginning of the year and the accumulated amount of this year in the most detailed subjects; Carefully set the operator's name, user code and password, and reasonably open the authority of each operator according to the accounting work division and internal control requirements; Correctly set the voucher type and accounting method of the enterprise. , write-off method, exchange rate accounting method, automatic transfer entries, illegal corresponding accounts, and various types of external equipment.

2, subject code setting should strive to be accurate and complete. After the implementation of computerized accounting, the subject code is the most important code of CAIS, which is in the core position. The processing of accounting subjects in the system is almost based on the account code, and the operation of the system is based on the account code. Therefore, it is very important to set the subjects and codes reasonably. Because of the high speed and precision of computer processing, the accounting subjects can be divided into fine enough, especially according to the needs of data retrieval in statements, and the series and bit length of the subjects can be set appropriately to obtain more detailed accounting data. However, we should avoid setting the series and bit length of the subject code too long, which is not conducive to memory and use, and also wastes storage space, and should be determined according to the whole subject system. For example, if only individual subjects need to be divided into more series, there is no need to adopt other methods to solve it, instead of increasing the series of the whole subject system because of taking care of individual subjects. However, if there are many details of the subjects at the same level, it is not necessary to solve them by appropriately increasing the series. After the system runs, it is difficult to modify or delete accounts. Therefore, it should be carefully considered when initializing, and the main code should be set completely. Generally, it should not be revised in the middle of the year.

3. Correct the errors caused by the vouchers. In CAIS, because the audited accounting vouchers are the data sources of general ledger, subsidiary ledger, journal, various auxiliary accounts and report data, if there is an error in the account book or report data, it can be judged that there must be an error in the accounting vouchers. There are three ways to modify an incorrect voucher: first, if an error is found when the voucher is not approved, the voucher maker can directly modify it; Second, if the voucher is found to have errors after review, the reviewer should cancel the review mark first, and then review it after being revised by the preparer; Third, if the voucher is found to be incorrect after posting, it cannot be modified. The preparer should first prepare the red-letter voucher, write off the wrong voucher, and then prepare the correct voucher. Red-ink vouchers and correct vouchers can be recorded after being audited by auditors, so as to correct wrong vouchers and account book data.

4. Correct the initial settings of the reporting system. The initial setup of report subsystem is the most complicated work in CAIS. At present, commercial CAIS mostly adopts general report program, that is, the system provides interface, and users define report name, table row type, empty table format, data source formula and so on. In this way, when the report format or data source changes, it is only necessary to modify the original definition without modifying the internal program of the system, thus meeting the needs of various users. At the time of initial setting, the setter is required to fully understand the principle of report preparation and the setting rules of formula expressions, especially the formula of data retrieval, because the error of a symbol in many formulas will lead to the error of report data. If the report data is found to be wrong, first find out the wrong data items that cause the final result of the report to be wrong, and check whether the data retrieval formula is wrong. If it is wrong, correct it. If it is correct, it can be judged that the account book or voucher data is wrong. According to the wrong data item formula, you can infer the error of the account book or voucher, correct it according to the above method of correcting the wrong voucher, and then regenerate the report.

5. Pay attention to the maintenance and safety of CAIS. Based on the characteristics of CAIS, it should be maintained regularly, and the maintenance work should accompany the whole operation stage until the system becomes obsolete or scrapped. The contents of maintenance include hardware equipment, financial software, data files and various coding maintenance. In addition to hardware maintenance, the above maintenance work may involve software maintenance, which shows that software maintenance is the most important and difficult work in system maintenance. Software maintenance can be divided into three types: correctness maintenance to correct program errors found in operation, adaptability maintenance when the external operating environment of software changes, and integrity maintenance to modify software due to system expansion or performance improvement. At the same time, the security of the system can be protected by establishing the internal control system of the accounting organization system, regularly modifying and keeping secret the passwords of the system and operators, regularly backing up and saving data, and enhancing the self-protection ability of the program itself.