Oracle general ledger (GL) Interview Questions & Answers

Question 1. Can A Flexfield Qualifier Be Changed After It Has Been Created?

Answer :

No. Once a segment qualifier has been designated for a specific segment and has been saved, it will permanently have the attributes with that qualifier.

For example, you accidentally designate the cost center segment as the natural account segment. Even though you do not compile this, the system saves the changes. And once it has been saved, it will have all the attributes designated for the natural account qualifier, even after it has been changed back, resaved with the correct qualifier and compiled. This is the inherent functionality of the software.

Unfortunately, there is no real easy solution for this issue. The only option is to create a new chart of accounts and attach a new set of books.

Question 2. How To Delete A Segment Value?

Answer :

There is no supported way to delete a segment value. Segment values can only be disabled not deleted.

Question 3. Is There A Way To Load Values For A Specific Segment Outside Of The Form?

Answer :

iSetup is the Oracle product that provides supported APIs to load values into Oracle Applications flexfields.

To load code combinations ADI may be used. Uploading zero amount journals will create new code combinations.

In this case Dynamic Insertion should be enabled and all account segment values need to exist before the new account code combinations will be dynamically created.

Question 4. What Are The Different Types Of Journals In General Ledger ?

Answer :

1. Functional Currency Jv: This Journal, we enter Local Currency transaction purpose.
2. Foreign Currency Jv: this Journal, we enter other than local currency transaction purpose...before we define exchange rates
3. Suspense Jv: this Journal, whenever debit is not equal to credit that time, we enable in set of books window Suspense button, then it works otherwise it's not working
4. Tax Jv: this Journal, calculate taxation of Purchased items
5. Reverse Jv: this Journal whenever we enter recurring journal, at the time of we using..We have two methods...one is Debit to Credit and second one is sign (+ to -)
6. Recurring Jv :this one is We define one template, we use Periodically, these are 3 types
   1.Standard 2.Skeleton 3.Formula
7. Mass Allocation Jv :Set of Expenses or Set of Revenue allocate different parts using Formula A*B/C
   A is Total Cost Pool..B is Usage Factor...C is Total Usage Factor...
8. Batch JV: Group of Journal we enter at a time, We Define Control Amount
9. Stat JV: This JV we have one side of Amount either debit or Credit.....

Question 5. What Is Average Balance In Oracle Financials?

Answer :

The Average Balance feature of Oracle General Ledger provides organizations with the ability to track average and end-of-day balances, report average balance sheets, and create custom reports using both standard and average balances. Average balance processing is particularly important for financial institutions, since average balance sheets are required, in addition to standard balance sheets, by many regulatory agencies. Many organizations also use average balances for internal management reporting and Profitability analysis.

The difference between an average and standard balance sheet is that balances are expressed as average amounts rather Than actual period-end amounts. An average balance is computed as the sum of the actual daily closing balance for a balance sheet account, divided by the number of calendar Days in the reporting period .

Question 6. Is There A Limit To The Number Of Periods In A Budget Year Or How Many Years A Budget Can Span?

Answer :

One can define budgetary control for n number of years however, one year can have maximum of 60 fiscal periods7.

Question 7. What Is A Funding Budget?

Answer :

A budget against which accounting transactions are checked for available funds when budgetary control is enable for your set of books.

Question 8. What Is Planning Budget?

Answer :

The plan for the future expenses is planning budget. It is a paper work. There is no funds requirement. It does not require journals. There are no restrictions for estimating of funds.

Question 9. I Was Able To Post A Budget Journal To A Closed Period, Why?

Answer :

Yes you can do so, reason being budget journal is not linked with your accounting period. Once you have open the budget period then you can book budget journal for that whole period.

Question 10. What Is The Specific Purpose Of Assigning Balancing Segment Values To The Legal Entity In Accounting Manager Setup (as Once Assigned, The Same Value Is Not Allowed To Be Selected For Any Other Legal Entity), If This Value Is Usable For The Operating Unit(s) That Does Not Have This Legal Entity Context?

Answer :

Summary of key facts:

1. Common COA Structure used for Primary and Secondary Ledgers
2. Ledger shared by Multiple Legal Entities
3. Specific Balancing Segment Values assigned to Specific Legal Entity (Overlap not allowed)
4. Specific Legal Entity Vision Operations Assigned to Payables Manager OU for Legal Entity Context
5. User preference set to Access Vision Operations OU by Default in Payables

Conclusion and Findings:

1. Balancing Segment Value Assignment to the Multiple Legal Entities, sharing the same Ledger does not seem to restrict the user of these Balancing Segment Values in the Feeder, Operating Unit specific Modules Like AP, wherein Legal Entity Context is passed to the OU through the link of the Primary Ledger.
2. However, access to these Balancing Segment Values could be controlled through Security Rules being assigned to the Value Set and the Respective Responsibility
3. The Key question is: If Legal Entity having the context to the Operating Unit that shares the common Ledger does not have assignment to it, what impact it has on the integrity of data when this access is otherwise allowed, except through Security Rules?

Question 11. What Are The Interface Tables In General Ledger ?

Answer :

GL_BUDGET_INTERFACE 
GL_DAILY_RATES_INTERFACE 
GL_IEA_INTERFACE 
GL_INTERFACE 
GL_INTERFACE_CONTROL 
GL_INTERFACE_HISTORY 

Question 12. What Is Dff?

Answer :

DFF is a mechanism that lets us create new fields in screens that are delivered by Oracle.

Question 13. Are These Dff's Flexible?

Answer :

A little flexible, for example, depending upon the value in a field, we can make  either Field1 or Field2  to appear in DFF. 

Question 14. Are These New Fields That Get Created As A Result Of Dff Free Text?

Answer :

If you attach a value set to the field(at time of setup of dff), then field will no longer be free text. The entered value in the field will be validated, also a list of valid values will be provided in LOV. 

Question 15. Will The Values That Get Entered By The User In Dff Fields Be Updated To Database?

Answer :

Indeed, this happens because for each field that you create using DFF will be mapped to  a column in Oracle Applications.

Question 16. Can I Create A Dff On Any Database Column?

Answer :

Not really. Oracle delivers a predefined list of columns for each table that are meant for DFF usage. Only those columns can be mapped to DFF segments. These columns are named similar to ATTRIBUTE1, ATTRIBUTE2, ATTRIBUTE3 ETC. Usually Oracle provides upto 15 columns, but this number can vary.

Question 17. Can I Add Hundreds Of Fields To A Given Screen?

Answer :

This depends on the number of attribute columns in the table that screen uses. Also, those columns must be flagged as DFF enabled in DFF Registration screen. Don't need to worry much about this because all the ATTRIBUTE columns are by default flagged for their DFF usage.

Question 18. What Is Journal Import?

Answer :

Journal import is an interface used to bring journal entries from legacy systems and other modules into the General Ledger.(Specifically Journal Import gets entries from legacy data into the GL base tables.

The tables populated during journal Import are

GL_JE_BATCHES,
GL_JE_HEADERS,
GL_JE_LINES,
GL_IMPORT_REFERENCES

Question 19. What Is The Use Of Gl_interface?

Answer :

Gl_Interface is the primary interface table of General ledger. It acts as an interface between data originating from other modules such as AP,AR, Legacy data and the Gl Base tables.

Question 20. What Is Actual Flag?

Answer :

Actual flag represents the Journal type.

A-Actual
B-Budget
E- Encumbrance.

Question 21. What Is Encumbrance?

Answer :

It is a process of Reservation of funds for anticipated expenditure from a budget. Encumbrance integrates GL, Purchasing and Payables modules.

Question 22. How Many Key Flex Fields Are There In General Ledger?

Answer :

One. Accounting Key Flex Field.

Question 23. How Many Types Of Budgets Are There?

Answer :

Two Types:

1. Expenditure Budgets
2. Revenue Budgets.

Question 24. What Are Spot Rate, Corporate Rate, Transaction Calendar And Accounting Calendar?

Answer :

Spot Rate: An exchange rate which you enter to perform conversion based on the rate on a specific date. It applies to the immediate delivery of currency.

Corporate Rate: An Exchange rate that we define to standardize rates for our company. This rate is the standard market rate determined by the senior financial management for use through out the organization.

User Rate: Conversion rate that is defined by the user.

EMU Fixed Rate: An exchange rate that is provided automatically by the General Ledger while entering journals. It uses a foreign currency that has a fixed relationship with the euro.

Transaction Calendar: Defines the business days and holidays for any calendar.

Accounting Calendar: Defines different types of calendars namely Fiscal, Federal Fiscal, Month etc.

Question 25. What Is Security Rule?

Answer :

Security Rules are defined to control the access of a flexfield segment value (Financial information) at a responsibility level.

Question 26. What Are Cross Validation & Adi?

Answer :

CVS – Cross validate segments – Allows only valid code combinations.

ADI – Allow dynamic inserts. – Allows any code combination irrespective of validity.

ADI would prevail if both of CVS and ADI are checked.

Question 27. What Is Translation?

Answer :

Translation is a process used to convert functional currency to other reporting currencies at the account balances level.

Question 28. What Is Revaluation?

Answer :

It is process used to revalue assets and liabilities denominated in foreign currency into functional currency based on period end exchange rate we specify. Unrealized gains/losses are resulted because of exchange rate fluctuations which are recorded in unrealized gain/loss account in GL.

Question 29. What Is Fsg (financial Statement Generator)?

Answer :

Financial statement generator feature helps us to generate reports such as balance sheets and income statements with out programming. It also provides a high degree of control on the rows, columns, contents and calculations on the report. Different components such as row set, column set, content set, row order, display set have to be defined before a statement is generated, of which row set and column set are mandatory.

Question 30. What Is Consolidation?

Answer :

Consolidation is a period-end process of combining the financial results of separate business subsidiaries with the parent company to form a single combined statement of financial results.

Question 31. At What Level General Ledger Data Is Secured?

Answer :

GL data is secured at Set of Book level. Subledger module data is secured at Responsibility level (i.e., at Operating Unit Level).

Question 32. Difference Between Primary Ledger And Secondary Ledger In R12 ?

Answer :

Primary ledger: The primary ledger acts as the primary accounting representation

Secondary Leger: Secondary ledgers represent the primary ledger's accounting data in another accounting representation that differs in one or more of the following ways: 

• chart of accounts
• accounting calendar/period type combination
• currency
• subledger accounting method
• ledger processing options

Use secondary ledgers for supplementary purposes, such as consolidation, statutory reporting, or adjustments for one or more legal entities within the same accounting setup. For example, use a primary ledger for corporate accounting purposes that uses the corporate chart of accounts and subledger accounting method, and use a secondary ledger for statutory reporting purposes that uses the statutory chart of accounts and subledger accounting method. This allows you to maintain both a corporate and statutory representation of the same legal entity's transactions in parallel. 

Assign one or more secondary ledgers to each primary ledger for an accounting setup. 

The secondary ledgers assigned can only perform the accounting for the legal entities within the same accounting setup. 

Question 33. In The Multi‐org Structure, At What Level Does Gl Operate?

Answer :

General Ledger operates at SOB level.

Question 34. What Are The Various Statuses Of Gl Periods? And In Which Table This Information Is Stored?

Answer :

The statuses of GL periods are are below:

• Open
• Closed
• Future ‐ Entry
• Permanently Closed
• Never Opened

The information is maintained in GL_PERIOD_STATUSES.

Question 35. If Journal Approval Flag Is Checked While Defining Set Of Books (sob) Then All Journals Will Necessarily Require Approval. Is This Statement Correct?

Answer :

In addition to enabling Journal Approval flag at SOB level; Require Journal Approval flag at Journal Sources level for journals to require approval.

Question 36. Does Gl Support Accrual Or Cash System Of Accounting?

Answer :

GL is a central repository and all the journal entries from sub‐ledger flow to GL. And there is no option to specify which method of accounting is allowed. So, such an option is available only at sub‐ledger level; at GL level, users are free to entry either type of entries. Hence, we can say that GL supports both methods of accounting.

Question 37. Journal Can Be Entered Only In Open Periods. Is This Statement Correct?

Answer :

No, journals can be entered both in Open and Future‐Entry periods. However, journals can be posted only in Open periods.

Question 38. Can A Gl Period Be Opened After The Period Is Being Closed? Can The Period Be Opened After The Closure Of Financial Year?

Answer :

Yes, a GL period can be opened any time after it is closed; even after financial year is closed (though not recommended). However, once a period is permanently closed it cannot be re‐opened.

Question 39. What Happens When The Posted Journal Are Changed?

Answer :

Posted Journal cannot be modified. They can only be reversed.

Question 40. What Is The Difference Between Revaluation And Translation?

Answer :

Revaluation is used to determine the position of foreign currency debtors, creditors etc at the end of month; and it created revaluation journal entries.

While Traslation is a functionality used to convert all balances including functional currency (say INR) balances in a given foreign currency (USD). Then, Trial Balance in that currency(USD) can be generated. It is used whenof a subsidiary or branch (INR) are required to be merged with another company reporting in different currency (USD).

Question 41. What Is The Meaning Of Retained Earning? Where The Retained Earning Account Given?

Answer :

Retained Earnings represent the undistributed profits of a company i.e. profits retained. The retained earning account is a mandatory account to be given at the time of defining Set of Books (SOB).

Question 42. Can The Gl Period Be Closed When There Are Unposted Journals In The Period? What Error Will It Give?

Answer :

Unlike AP and AR, where period cannot be closed unless all transactions are processed; GL period can be closed even if there are unposted journals. So, it gives no error as such.

Question 43. What Are The Maximum Number Of Period That Can Be Open In Gl?

Answer :

There is no limit on number of periods that can be concurrently open GL; however, it is advised to keep the number of GL Open periods to minimum.

Question 44. What Are The Key Tables Of Gl Module?

Answer :

The tables that store the information of GL journals are ‐ GL_JE_BATCHES ‐ GL_JE_HEADERS ‐ GL_JE_LINES While the summary of balances is stored in GL_BALANCES. And the GL interface table is GL_INTERFACE.

Question 45. What Is The Difference Fsg Report And D2k Report?

Answer :

Financial Statement Generator (FSG) is a functionality GL which can used to develop financial reports based on data in GL only (i.e. sub‐ledger details cannot be displayed in the report) and FSG reports can be developed by functional users. However, to develop a D2K report knowledge of table structures and SQL (may be even PL/SQL) would be required. And using D2K report can be build for any module or extract data from multiple modules based on user requirement.

Question 46. What Are The Various Type Of Balances Supported By Gl?

Answer :

Oracle GL supports three type are balances which are:

• Actual
• Encumbrance
• Budger

Question 47. What Are The Various Type Of Accounts In Gl? And At What Point Is The Type Of Account Identified? And Explain The Nature Of Accounts?

Answer :

Five type of accounts are maintained in GL

1. Expense (E)
2. Revenue (R)
3. Asset (A)
4. Liabiltiy (L)
5. Owner's Equity (O)

While defining the Natual Account segment values, in the segment qualifier we specify the nature of account. The type of account for a Code combination is stored in GL_CODE_COMBINATIONS

Expense and Revenue accounts represent expenses/losses and Revenues/Gains respectively. And these accounts have a ZERO balance at the start of the year. This point has to be taken care of while developing reports where Opening Balance is calculated rather than using GL_BALANCES table.

Owner's Equity represent Share Capital and includes retained earnings and reserves, if any. Owner's Equity along with Asset and Liability Balances are carried forward at the end of year.

Question 48. Explain The Concepts Of Ptd, Ytd, Qtd And Pjtd In Gl?

Answer :

All the below are various ways of calculating balances and each indicate the starting point since when the balance is calculated

PTD ‐ Period To date (i.e. from the start of period till date)
YTD ‐ Year to date
QTD ‐ Quater to Date
PJTD ‐ Project to Date (i.e. from the start of the project and it can span multiple years)

Question 49. What Is A Funding Budget? And What Is Its Purpose?

Answer :

A funding budget is a budget for which 'Require Budget Journals' check box is checked. Funding budget can be used to control expenses if budgeting control is enabled at Set of Books (SOB) level.

Question 50. What Is The Maximum Number Of Periods Allowed In A Year While Defining Gl Calendar? Can You Two Periods In Gl Calendar Overlap?

Answer :

GL calander allows for 1 to 366 periods per year. And two periods cannot overlap unless one of them is an adjustment period.