Customize Cash Flow Report in ERPNext
As your business grows, your Chart of Accounts becomes more detailed and your financial reporting requirements may evolve beyond ERPNext’s default Cash Flow Report.
The standard report automatically classifies accounts into operating, investing, and financing activities. However, it may not always categorize accounts correctly, especially when using a customized Chart of Accounts or organization-specific reporting formats.
ERPNext allows you to fully customize the Cash Flow Report by defining how accounts should appear and how each section of the report should be structured.
Custom Cash Flow Reports let you create reports that match your organization’s accounting standards while improving the accuracy of cash flow classification.
1. How Custom Cash Flow Reporting Works
ERPNext uses two doctypes to generate a customized Cash Flow Report:
- Cash Flow Mapping
- Cash Flow Mapper
Cash Flow Mapping
A Cash Flow Mapping represents an individual line item in the Cash Flow Report.
Each mapping defines:
- Display Label
- Related Accounts
- Special calculation flags such as Working Capital, Finance Cost, or Income Tax
Cash Flow Mapper
A Cash Flow Mapper represents an entire section of the Cash Flow Statement.
ERPNext provides three predefined sections:
- Operating Activities
- Investing Activities
- Financing Activities
Each section contains one or more Cash Flow Mappings.
2. Enable Custom Cash Flow Format
Before creating custom mappings, enable the feature.
Navigate to:
Accounting → Accounting Masters → Accounts Settings
Then:
- Open Accounts Settings.
- Enable Use Custom Cash Flow Format.
- Save the document.
Once enabled, ERPNext will generate Cash Flow Reports using your custom mappings instead of the default report format.
3. Create Cash Flow Mappings
Create a Cash Flow Mapping for every line that should appear in your report.
Each mapping contains:
- Name – Internal identifier.
- Label – Text displayed in the report.
- Accounts – One or more Chart of Accounts linked to the line item.
Examples of mappings include:
- Income Taxes Recognised in Profit or Loss
- Finance Costs Recognised in Profit or Loss
- Depreciation of Non-current Assets
- Trade Receivables
- Trade Payables
- Inventory
- Other Liabilities
4. Configure Special Mapping Types
Certain mappings require additional options to ensure ERPNext performs the correct calculations.
Income Tax Expense
Enable:
- Is Income Tax Expense
This allows ERPNext to correctly adjust tax expenses within Operating Activities.
Finance Cost
Enable:
- Is Finance Cost
This ensures finance costs are properly adjusted in the report.
Working Capital Items
Enable:
- Is Working Capital
Typical Working Capital mappings include:
- Trade Receivables
- Trade Payables
- Inventory
- Taxes Payable
- Other Current Liabilities
If you select a parent account, ERPNext automatically considers the net movement of all its child accounts when generating the Cash Flow Report.
5. Configure Cash Flow Mappers
Once individual mappings are created, they must be assigned to their respective Cash Flow sections.
Navigate to:
Accounting → Cash Flow Mapper
ERPNext provides three standard Cash Flow Mappers:
- Operating Activities
- Investing Activities
- Financing Activities
Although these sections cannot be deleted, they can be renamed and customized.
Each Cash Flow Mapper contains:
- Section Name
- Section Header
- Section Subtotal Label
- Section Footer Label
- Cash Flow Mapping table
Add the required Cash Flow Mapping records to the appropriate section and save the document.
6. Configure Operating Activities
The Operating Activities section generally includes:
- Net Profit
- Income Tax Expense
- Finance Costs
- Depreciation
- Changes in Working Capital
After assigning these mappings, refresh the Cash Flow Report to review the updated structure.
7. Configure Investing Activities
Create additional Cash Flow Mappings for investment-related transactions, such as:
- Purchase of Property, Plant and Equipment
- Sale of Fixed Assets
- Investments
- Investment Income
Assign these mappings to the Investing Activities Cash Flow Mapper.
8. Configure Financing Activities
Create mappings for financing-related cash flows, including:
- Equity Contributions
- Loan Proceeds
- Loan Repayments
- Dividend Payments
Assign them to the Financing Activities Cash Flow Mapper.
9. View the Customized Report
Once all mappings have been created and assigned:
- Open the Cash Flow Report.
- Select the desired reporting period.
- Run the report.
ERPNext will generate the Cash Flow Statement using your customized format and account classifications.
10. Best Practices
- Create separate mappings for each financial statement line.
- Group accounts with similar reporting purposes together.
- Use parent accounts only when all child accounts share the same cash flow classification.
- Review mappings whenever your Chart of Accounts changes.
- Validate the report against your organization’s accounting standards before using it for financial reporting.
11. Benefits of Custom Cash Flow Reports
- Supports organization-specific reporting formats.
- Improves classification accuracy.
- Provides detailed Operating, Investing, and Financing sections.
- Handles customized Charts of Accounts more effectively.
- Produces professional financial reports aligned with accounting standards.
