STATION BALANCE SHEET
The main function of the Railway is sell the ‘Transport’. This selling of the ‘Transport’ means the selling of tickets to passengers and booking of other coaching and Goods traffic.
The station is a place where the transactions originally take place and are recorded in the initial documents. The earnings from different sources are brought to account in different returns and statements required to be prepared separately for each category.
Station Balance Sheet is a statement of Account prepared by Station Master in the duly prescribed proforma and under prescribed Heads of Accounts showing the liabilities accrued at Station. on account of sale of Transport services.
The station master is responsible for accounting to the Government all the items of earnings which accrue at the station and for the realization of which he is responsible. He clears his liabilities either through remittance of cash or vouchers or through other items of special credit, the balance indicating outstanding at the station. It is thus for the purpose of taking to account all the liabilities and credits under classified heads that a summarized statement called station balance sheet and it is prepared by the station master and submitted to the accounts office after the close of the month incorporating therein all the transactions for the month to which it pertains.
The station balance sheet is prepared separately for coaching and goods transactions in the prescribed format.
The station balance Sheet will have two sides. Left hand side is known as debit side where as Right Hand Side is known as credit side.
All such items will be shown on the debit side for which SM is responsible to recover the charges for rendering of different types of services. In short, debit side will show the liability of Station Master for recovery of charges.
The debit side and credit side of Balance Sheet should be equal in amount. But in practice generally total of debit side will be more than the credit side because every time it is not possible to recover the freight charges accrued during the month in the same months account and there is difference between debit side and credit side. To equal the amount of debit and credit side the difference between debit side and credit side is shown as "Closing Balance " on credit side of the Balance Sheet . This closing balance in the other words is known as Station Outstanding comprising of different items.
Whatever the figures shown in the Balance Sheet are summarized figures extracted from different books and it is the responsibility of the Station Master to prove the figures by enclosing certain returns. Information regarding Local and foreign traffic will be given in the same Balance Sheet although returns for Local and foreign traffic will be prepared separately.
Checks on station Balance Sheet.
The debit side may be divided into 3 parts opening balance, current debits and special debits (accountal of Error Sheet).
Opening balance is checked with the closing balance which is shown in the previous months Balance sheet. Current debits are checked with reference to various returns such as passenger classification copy of outward paid cash book, inward to-pay parcel abstracts and summaries, Warf. & Dem. statements and wagon registration fees statement. In addition to this, accountal of Goods traffic for current month will be checked with converted abstracts. The amount of E/sheet accounted for in the 3rd part will be checked with reference to entries of E/sheet recorded in the E/sheet register by the T/Accounts office.
The credit side of the station B/sheet is also divided into 3 parts (1)Cash and cash voucher duly acknowledged by chief cashier (2)Special Credit (3)Closing balance. Cash and cash vouchers as acknowledged by the chief cashier are checked with the cash remittance foil received from the cashier .The amount of cash remittance Note is posted in the register and checked with date-wise posting of cash remittance Note in the station B/sheet.
Special credits are checked with the enclosed documents such as refund list, paid on to-pay statement certified over charges deduction list credit advice Notes etc. received in T-Accounts office along with the station B/sheet.
Closing balance must be supported by the statements showing full particulars of the amounts yet to be cleared by the Station Master. The totals of the debit and credit side of the Stn. B/sheet should be checked to see that they are correct and both the sides totals are equal in amount. If the amount of the returns received in the Traffic Accounts is in excess of the amount shown in the station Balance Sheet, the amount of the Station Balance Sheet is corrected and difference of amount is debited against station. If the amount shown in the Balance Sheet is in excess of amount of return received , it is taken into consideration that a part of the return is missing and such differences are entered in the register of missing returns and the same are called for from the station.
If the amount of credit taken in the station Balance Sheet exceeds the amount of Special credit taken under the supporting documents enclosed to the station Balance Sheet , the difference is debited against the station and closing balance in subject balance sheet is increased to the tune of difference.
The result of check of the Station Balance Sheet in the traffic Accounts office is intimated to the station through advice of Internal Check, showing closing balance as per Stn. Balance Sheet and the closing Balance Sheet as worked out by the Traffic Accounts office during the course of internal check. The difference between the two will be explained in detail in respective column of the advice of internal check.
