Escheatment
In accounting, escheatment means remitting unclaimed property — uncashed vendor checks, customer credit balances — to the state after its dormancy period.
- Layer
- Lexicon
- Defined in
- Lexicon
- Also called
- Unclaimed property, Escheat
- Nearby
- 4
Not a rule
State unclaimed property law — not codified in GAAP. US GAAP governs recognition, measurement and presentation — not the mechanics a bookkeeper uses to get there. Anyone citing a standard for this word is citing the wrong thing.
Every citation in this system, with the text we read and the date we checked it, is in US GAAP and where these rules come from.
For founders
The same idea written for a founder: what it costs a startup that ignores it, and what to do in a real month.
- Bank reconciliation step by stepMatch the bank statement to the books, clear deposits in transit and outstanding checks, book the fees, and reach a $0.00 difference every month.
- How to pay vendors: ACH vs wire vs check vs cardACH, wire, check or card: what each payment rail costs, how long it takes, where the fraud risk sits, and how each payment is recorded in the books.
What it is not called
Each of these is a real word for a different thing. Using it here is what makes a product read as though it was built by someone who has not done the work.
- writing back to income
Nearby in the catalog
No component names this concept outright. These are the ones in its part of the system, which is a weaker claim — but a component nothing links to is a component nobody finds.
Terms this one depends on
- Dormancy periodThe time without owner contact after which property — an uncashed vendor check, a customer credit balance, unpaid wages — is presumed abandoned and must be reported to the state. Commonly three years for vendor checks and one year for wages, varying by state and property type
- CreditThe right column. It increases liabilities, equity and revenue, and decreases assets and expenses.
- PeriodA fiscal reporting window
- VendorA party we buy from
Also in Cash
Defined in Lexicon. This page is generated from that document, so the two cannot disagree.