Your chart of accounts decides which spend Avarni reads for your Scope 3 calculation.
The file we need
Send your chart of accounts as a flat table with three columns:
Column | Contents |
Account Code | The code your finance system uses |
Account Name | The description of the account |
Account Type | Asset, Liability, Equity, Revenue or Expense |
Flat means one row per account, with no grouping, indenting or merged cells. If your finance system exports a nested or hierarchical chart of accounts, flatten it before you send it.
Step 1. Upload the chart of accounts
Go to Assessments and open your assessment.
Select Chart of Accounts.
Upload the file and map the three columns.
How does Avarni categorise my accounts?
When you upload the chart of accounts, AI gives each account a category and writes a justification for it. This is a first draft for you to review.
The AI reads only the account code, account name and account type, plus your organisation's industry and country. It does not read the transactions in the account.
The account type has a large effect on the result. Check the Account Type column in your file before you upload it.
Account type | Starting category |
Expense | Usually Purchased goods and services or another emissions category. An expense account starts as Excluded only when its name shows a term such as tax, payroll, interest, bank fees, carbon offsets or depreciation. |
Asset | Capital goods for owned physical assets. Upstream leased assets for right-of-use and other lease assets. |
Revenue and Liability | Always Excluded at upload. |
Equity | Usually Excluded. |
Do I need to check every account?
Yes. Review every account until each one is Confirmed. The AI result is a starting point, not a final decision.
The Review Status column shows the state of each account:
Status | Meaning |
Pending | The AI categorised the account and raised no concern. You have not reviewed it yet. |
Flagged | The account needs a closer look. Avarni flags an account when the AI is uncertain, when a default rule changed the AI's category, when the category does not suit the account type, or when the AI could not categorise it. |
Confirmed | You reviewed the account and accept its category and justification. |
Start with the Flagged accounts. Then work through the Pending accounts.
To change the status of one account, select an icon in the Review Status column: the flag icon (Flag) or the tick icon (Confirm).
If your finance team must check an account, set it to Flagged. Then filter on Flagged to see the accounts that are still open.
Why are two accounts with the same name in different categories?
The AI judges each account separately. It cannot see what the accounts contain, so two accounts with the same name can get different categories.
The account type can also cause the difference. For example, if one of the accounts has the type Revenue or Liability, Avarni sets it to Excluded.
Ask your finance team what each account holds. Then set the correct category on each account and update each justification.
Step 2. Decide what to include
Include broadly. Exclude narrowly.
It is safer to include an account that turns out to be irrelevant than to leave out an account that contained supplier spend. You can catch irrelevant transactions later with a classification rule. You cannot classify a transaction that never arrived.
Include every expense account that could contain payments to a supplier. Include balance sheet accounts that could hold capital purchases.
What to exclude
Exclude these:
Sales and revenue accounts. Money coming in is not procurement.
Payroll accounts. Employee costs are not purchased goods and services. Commuting and travel are handled separately.
Tax accounts. GST, income tax and payroll tax are transfers to government, not purchases.
Intercompany accounts. Anything tagged intercompany nets out inside the group and would be double counted.
Accruals. These are timing entries, not transactions with a supplier.
Refunds and rebates. These reverse spend that is already counted.
Cost of goods sold, where the underlying purchases are already captured in another account.
How do I treat asset, liability and equity accounts?
Account type | What to do |
Asset | Include accounts that hold purchases of property, plant and equipment. Include capitalised leases, such as right-of-use assets. Exclude accumulated depreciation accounts. |
Liability | Exclude. This includes outstanding claims and other provisions. |
Equity | Exclude. |
Why liability accounts are excluded: the general ledger records each transaction twice. A supplier cost is a debit to an expense or asset account and a credit to a liability account. If you include both, the credit cancels the debit and the spend becomes nil. Include only the expense or asset side.
Avarni excludes depreciation and amortisation expense accounts by default. This default does not cover accumulated depreciation accounts with the type Asset. Check these accounts and set them to Excluded.
Why does Capital goods show a negative total?
A capital goods account can also hold depreciation or amortisation entries. These entries are credits, so they reduce the account total and can make it negative. Only the additions (new purchases) belong in Capital goods.
Send transaction-level detail for these accounts. Then exclude the depreciation and amortisation entries with a classification rule.
Accounts that net to nil
Some charts of accounts contain duplicate or retired accounts marked "do not use". If the transactions in such an account net to nil within that same account, you can leave the account out. Your trial balance still balances.
Confirm the transactions net to nil within the account, not across several accounts. If they net across accounts, send us the account details so we can add them.
How do I filter the chart of accounts?
Open Chart of Accounts and select Categorisation.
Select the filter icon (Filters) in the toolbar.
Choose a column, such as Category, Review Status or Account Type. Then choose the value.
To find one account, select the search icon (Search) and type part of its code or name.
To save a filter:
Set up the filter.
In Saved Filter Presets, select the plus icon (Create new filter).
Enter a Filter Name and select Create Filter.
To use a saved filter, open Filters and select its name. If you change a saved filter, select the save icon (Update selected filter). Saved filters belong to the assessment, so other users of the assessment can use them too.
How do I change or confirm many accounts at once?
Filter the list to the accounts you want to change.
Select the checkbox next to each account. To select all accounts on the page, select the checkbox in the header row.
Select Bulk Edit. The button shows the number of accounts you selected.
In Field, choose Category, Status or Justification. Then set the Value.
To change another field in the same edit, select Add field.
Select Apply.
The header checkbox selects only the accounts on the current page. A page shows up to 100 accounts. If the filtered list has more pages, repeat the steps on each page.
To confirm accounts, choose Status and set it to Confirmed.
When you change the category, add Justification with the new reason in the same edit. Avarni does not update the justification when the category changes.
If you add Justification and leave the value empty, Avarni clears the justification on every selected account.
Where do I record why an account is included or excluded?
Use the Justification column. Write each justification so that an auditor can follow your decision.
The AI writes the first justification from the account code, name and type only. Add what your finance team knows about the account.
To edit a justification:
Double-click the cell in the Justification column.
Type the new text. The limit is 1,024 characters.
Click outside the cell to save.
When you change the category of an account, update its justification too. Avarni does not rewrite it for you.
To share the record, select the download icon (Export). Then select Download as CSV or Download as Excel. The file contains the accounts that match your current filter and the columns on the screen.
Step 3. Send the general ledger for the included accounts
After you confirm your inclusions, request a general ledger extract from your finance team that covers only the included accounts. Ask for transaction-level detail, not a summary.
Transaction-level detail lets Avarni read supplier names and line descriptions. A trial balance alone gives account totals, which produces a coarser result.
Check the ledger is complete
The Chart of Accounts screen has two views. Categorisation is where you decide what to include. Completeness Check compares the ledger you loaded against the movement in your trial balances, account by account.
Once the general ledger is loaded, switch to Completeness Check and confirm your included accounts tie out. See Check your general ledger is complete against your trial balances.
If you change your inclusions later
When you change the category of an account, or exclude it, Avarni updates the transactions that are already loaded. The counts and the classification rules update on their own. You do not need to reload the general ledger.
If you include an account that was excluded when you uploaded the general ledger, its transactions are not in Avarni. Rows for excluded accounts show an account code error at upload, so they were not loaded. Upload the missing rows for that account as a separate file, or reload the general ledger.
Add accounts later
To add accounts, send us a spreadsheet with the account code, account name and account type for each new account. We insert them for you.
Next financial year
Your chart of accounts belongs to your organisation, so it is already there in the new year. Which accounts are included, their categories and your classification rules belong to the assessment, so you set them up again. See Start a new financial year.