How Landara and your books fit together
The full double entry picture: what raises your Inventory account, what releases it, and why transfers between locations post nothing at all.
Updated 4 October 2026
Landara is a cost ledger, not a second set of books. It tracks what your stock cost and when it moved, then hands your accounting software a small number of well-defined entries. This page is the whole picture, so you know what to expect in your books and what to reconcile.
The core loop
Two entries, in this order:
| When | Entry | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| You receive stock | Dr Inventory / Cr Accounts Payable | The bill you publish from Landara (in Xero, once you approve it) |
| The stock sells | Dr Cost of Goods Sold / Cr Inventory | The COGS journal you post from the COGS report |
The first entry is what puts the cost on your balance sheet. The second releases it to the profit and loss as the goods actually sell. Between them, your Inventory account is a running record of what you are holding.
Both halves are required. If your Products mapping sends purchases to an expense account, the first entry never debits Inventory, and the COGS journal then credits an account nothing put anything into. See Map your tax and GL accounts.
From day one: how the two sides stay in step
This is how most stores start, and what you should see at each step.
- Connect Shopify. Landara reads your products, quantities and costs.
- Sync your opening stock. Each product's quantity and cost becomes a cost layer, and Landara values what you hold. Nothing is sent to your books yet.
- Post the opening balance. On a new accounting file, Landara puts your stock value into the empty Inventory account. Both sides now agree.
- Buy more stock and publish the bill from Landara. In Xero the bill arrives as a draft, and a draft posts nothing, so your Inventory account does not move yet. When the stock is received, Landara's value goes up and the valuation page lists the shipment as draft in Xero. That explains the gap, so the difference stays at zero.
- Approve the bill in Xero. Now it posts. Your Inventory account goes up by the same amount, the shipment drops off the list, and the two sides match again.
In QuickBooks a bill is posted the moment it is created, so steps 4 and 5 happen together. If a shipment has more than one bill, for example the supplier's and the freight forwarder's, it stays on the list until all of them are approved.
Bills you enter yourself
Some bills never go through Landara: one typed straight into Xero, or one that arrived after you connected. One rule covers all of them:
Each dollar of stock reaches your Inventory account exactly once.
So before you code a bill like that, ask how its stock got into Landara's value:
| Where the stock came from | Code the bill to | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Stock you already held when you connected Shopify, with the bill arriving later | Not Inventory. Usually your opening balance offset account, but check with your accountant | Your opening balance already put this stock in Inventory. Coding the bill there too counts it twice |
| New stock costed through a Landara shipment | Inventory. Then mark the shipment In my books on the valuation page | Landara has the cost and your bill puts it in the books. The mark tells Landara not to wait for a bill of its own |
| New stock received in Shopify with no Landara shipment, picked up when you reconcile with Shopify | Inventory | Landara values the stock but posts nothing for it, so the bill is the only entry. Until the bill is approved, the valuation page shows a difference of that amount |
| Stock found in a stocktake, where you posted the found stock journal | Not Inventory. Use the shrinkage account that journal credited | The found stock journal already put it in Inventory. Coding the bill to shrinkage cancels that gain, so the stock counts once and your profit is right |
If you are not sure which row a bill belongs to, leave it in draft and ask your accountant. A draft changes nothing in either place.
Everything Landara can post
| Journal | Entry | Triggered by |
|---|---|---|
| COGS | Dr Cost of Goods Sold / Cr Inventory | Posting a period from the COGS report |
| Revaluation | Dr or Cr Inventory vs Inventory adjustment | Reconciling the valuation page against your books |
| Write-down | Dr Inventory adjustment / Cr Inventory | Reducing the value of stock you still hold |
| Shrinkage | Dr Shrinkage / Cr Inventory | Committing a stocktake with a variance |
| Opening balance | Dr Inventory / Cr Opening balance offset | Opening a brand new accounting file, once only |
| Goods received not invoiced | Dr Inventory / Cr GRNI accrual at month end, reversed on the 1st | Posting the accrual pair from the COGS report for stock received on a purchase order before its bill |
That is the complete list. Nothing else Landara does writes to your accounting software.
Two dates matter on every import: the day the bill is dated and the day the goods land. The bill moves your Inventory account on the first; the cost layer is dated the second. When a month end falls between them, the books and the valuation differ for a month, and that is timing rather than a fault. Goods received before the invoice, and goods invoiced before they arrive explains both gaps and what Landara posts for them.
One entry Landara works out and deliberately does not post: the journal that moves your stock value out of the account you used before Landara. It is shown on the valuation page for your accountant to enter, because part of it is a judgement about which side is wrong, and the two possible answers have opposite remedies. See the journal your accountant posts.
What does not post
This is worth knowing, because it is the source of most "why did nothing happen" questions.
- Creating a cost layer posts nothing. Importing a PO, importing a shipment, adding a manual layer or syncing opening stock all write to Landara's ledger only. Your Inventory account moves when you publish the bill, not when you record the cost.
- Receiving stock in Shopify posts nothing. Landara reads Shopify movements to cost them. It does not create accounting entries from them.
- Transfers between locations post nothing. More on this below.
- Sales themselves post nothing. Your COGS journal is posted per period, by you, when you are ready.
Transfers are cost neutral
Moving stock from one location to another is Inventory to Inventory. The total value of what you hold has not changed, no goods have been sold, and no new stock has arrived. So there is nothing to tell your accounting software.
Landara moves the FIFO cost with the stock internally, so the destination location knows what its stock cost and the source location stops carrying value it no longer holds. That happens entirely inside Landara's ledger. There is no goods in transit account, and a transfer never appears in your COGS figure or in any journal.
Transfers only affect the Cost at Fulfilment basis, where costs are tracked per location. On the Cost at Sale basis, locations are blended, so a transfer is a no-op there by definition.
The COGS journal is sales only
The figure Landara posts as COGS covers goods that sold. Inventory adjustments, shrinkage and write-downs are deliberately excluded, because they are not cost of sale and most accountants want them visible separately. Each has its own journal and its own account, so your profit and loss shows the difference between "we sold stock" and "we lost stock".
Reconciling
Once the loop is running, your Inventory account and Landara's on-hand value should track each other. The inventory valuation page compares them live and lets you post a reconciling journal for drift it cannot otherwise account for.
The reconciling journal is deliberately not offered while the difference is still your opening position: stock sitting in your old inventory account, COGS journalled before the new one was opened, or an opening balance posted short. That journal offsets to the Inventory adjustment account, which is a profit and loss account, and putting a conversion balance through it would show a large fictitious gain. Those are entries your accountant posts, and the valuation page states them.
Which account it compares against changes once, at setup: until you confirm your opening position it reads the account that held your stock before Landara, and after that it reads the account Landara posts to.
On day one they will not agree, and that is expected rather than a fault. See Your opening difference before you post anything to close that gap.
