Why am I being asked to confirm this posting?
You tried to save a Spend Money, Receive Money or manual journal entry and instead of posting, Sales Scribe showed:
Please confirm before this is posted — This increases what someone owes the company, and they did not hold the office their account is named for on [date].
Nothing has gone wrong, and nothing has been lost. Your entry is still on screen exactly as you typed it.
What triggered it
Both of these were true:
- The entry increases what a person owes the company on their running account — a director's loan account, member's loan or partner's current account.
- That person did not hold the office the account is named for on the date of the document — they have resigned, their appointment had not started yet, or no appointment has ever been recorded for them.
The message names the person, their standing, the account, and the figure their debt moves from and to.
What to do
If it is right: tick I have checked this and want to post it and save again. It posts exactly as entered — same amounts, same date, same journal. Nothing is changed by confirming, and nothing is blocked.
If the date is wrong: correct the document date and save. A transaction dated before someone's appointment is a common cause.
If the appointment is wrong: the person may genuinely still be an officer and the register may not say so. Go to Settings → Directors & officers, open them, and check the Ended date on the appointment. Correct it there and the prompt stops.
If you picked the wrong person's account: change the category on the line. Every running account is labelled with its holder's name, so check the name on the account you chose.
"What they owed beforehand cannot be read"
Instead of a figure, the prompt sometimes says the earlier position cannot be read. That means the account's history does not go back as far as the document's date — usually because the account was adopted from an earlier system, or opened with a balance rather than built up from postings.
You are still offered the posting. The figure is shown as unknown rather than quietly filled in with nil, because a balance that cannot be known should not be presented as a fact.
When you will not be asked
- The person holds the office on that date. Lending to a serving director is ordinary business and is never queried.
- Your organisation has no such office — a sole trader.
- The entry reduces what they owe, or leaves it unchanged. A credit cannot increase someone's debt.
Is this a tax warning?
No. Sales Scribe does not hold the close-company, participator or employment facts that the s455 and beneficial-loan rules turn on, so it does not and cannot tell you whether a charge arises. The prompt exists because this is the kind of figure your accountant will ask about — it asks you to look, not to conclude.
Your confirmation is recorded in the audit log, with what you were shown at the time.