Representing complex transactions / currency conversions

[Walder Reed]

Hi there,

I’m fairly new to Beancount and I’m trying to import my last couple of years of payslips, however I’ve run into a snag with a fairly complex multi-currency transaction. I work for an international company and moved offices in 2018. My company paid out my full end of year bonus in my new country (CH), but needed to withhold taxes on a prorated portion of my bonus in my old country (AU). 

The tricky parts are two-fold: 

1. My company doesn’t know the exact withholding amount at the point my bonus is paid out, so they withhold an approximate amount. Then, in the following month they either refund or further deduct the difference.

2. The actual currency conversions used aren’t specified anywhere - instead I need to infer the amount by looking at the bonus amount on my AU payslip (which is netted out to zero).

Here is my current best attempt to represent this by moving the CH withheld amount to a temporary account at an inferred exchange rate:

2019-01-25 ! "Hooli CH Paystub"

  period: "2019-01-01 - 2019-01-31"

  Income:CH:Hooli:Salary                                                                 -19307.7 CHF

  Income:CH:Hooli:HealthInsuranceContrib                                                     -675 CHF

  Income:AU:Hooli:AnnualBonus                                                           -16433.75 CHF

  Income:CH:Hooli:AnnualBonus                                                           -45566.25 CHF

  Income:CH:Hooli:Pension                                                                 -2133.5 CHF

  Assets:AU:HoldingForTaxes                         22741.72/16433.75*7723.85 AUD @@      7723.85 CHF

  Expenses:Taxes:CH:Tax                                                                   24162.2 CHF

  Assets:CH:Pension                                                                          4267 CHF

  Assets:CH:Checking                                                                     47963.15 CHF

2019-01-25 ! "Hooli AU Paystub"

  Income:AU:Hooli:Super                                                                  -2274.17 AUD

  Assets:AU:Super                                                                         2274.17 AUD

  Assets:AU:HoldingForTaxes                                                             -10660.00 AUD

  Expenses:Taxes:AU                                                                      10660.00 AUD

2019-02-25 * "Hooli CH Paystub"

  period: "2019-02-01 - 2019-02-28"

  Income:CH:Hooli:Salary                                                                 19437.75 CHF

  Income:CH:Hooli:PeerBonus                                                                  -200 CHF

  Income:CH:Hooli:Pension                                                                 -2133.5 CHF

  Expenses:Taxes:CH:TaxAtSource                                                           8086.85 CHF

  Assets:CH:MSSB:Withholding                                                              -3040.4 CHF

  Assets:AU:HoldingForTaxes                                  -22741.72/16433.75*20.70   @@ -20.70 CHF

  Assets:CH:Pension                                                                          4267 CHF

  Expenses:Misc                                                                            481.75 CHF

  Assets:CH:Checking                                                                     12471.75 CHF

2019-02-26 pad Assets:AU:HoldingForTaxes Expenses:RoundingErrors

2019-02-26 balance Assets:AU:HoldingForTaxes 0 AUD

My question for you all is: is there a more elegant way to represent this?  A couple of things stand out to me as particularly messy:

1. The complex inline manual currency conversion - is there is a better way to move the money into AUD without 

2. For the refund amount of $20.70 CHF I get a warning about negative prices and a reference to http://furius.ca/beancount/doc/bug-negative-prices, but it’s not clear to me how to “fix” this. I really do want a negative amount here?

3. I’d ideally like to zero out the HoldingForTaxes account without an additional pad + balance assertion. Is there a way I can reference the remaining amount in the third transaction and use that so that the “rounding error” gets absorbed into the exchange rate?

Thanks,

Walder