How does the accounts payable ledger work?
The difference between a balance and a ledger is the difference between an outcome and the path to it. An auditor who asks what was outstanding on a reference date wants to know which invoices those were; a total does not answer that question.
The payables side is also the side your own deductions hang on. Every outstanding purchase invoice is a cost item and usually also input VAT (voorbelasting). If that ledger is not kept up, the support for your deduction is not either.
For most sole proprietorships (eenmanszaken) this is small work: a handful of suppliers and a few invoices a month. It only becomes a problem when switching, because then the opening balance often comes across as one amount and the individual items are gone.
Where is the accounts payable ledger in the law?
These legal sources come from the specialist dossiers that were reviewed on 24 August 2026. Mind the difference that becomes large in a dispute: a statutory article next to a value is where that value is found, not a justification for how it applies to your situation.
- Article 52(4) of the Dutch General State Taxes Act (AWR)designates, among other things, the accounts payable records as core data with a seven-year retention obligation
- Article 52(1) and (2) of the Dutch General State Taxes Act (AWR)requires records from which your rights and obligations are clear at all times
The links go to the statutory text on wetten.overheid.nl, in the version that applied on 24 September 2026.
What does basestep do with the accounts payable ledger?
This is a real gap and it is here because you should know it: when you switch, your payables balance currently comes in as one total and not as individual items. Designated core data should exist per item. It is planned above receipt storage, precisely because the law names this explicitly and does not name the receipt.
All calculations, explanations and signals in basestep are calculation support and instruction, not tax or legal advice. Amounts are estimates based on your own input; the Dutch tax authority (Belastingdienst) sets the assessment.
Where does it go wrong with the accounts payable ledger?
The two mistakes you run into most often in practice with this term, and what they cost you.
Taking over an opening balance as one amount
When switching, that is the easy route, and it costs you the individual items the law designates. Take over the open invoices, not the balance.
Thinking it is only about paying
Your cost deduction and usually your input VAT hang on every open purchase invoice. A gap here is also a gap in your support.
Further reading
Three places this term is tied to, inside this glossary and beyond.