Patent ID: 7895095

Claim:
A program storage device readable by a machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions which upon being executed by a machine causes the machine to perform a method for creating a valid chart of accounts from which an administrator can facilitate and enable a requisitioner to select a valid general ledger account, said method comprising: establishing a communication link with an external enterprise catalog system to build an appropriate chart of accounts for a given company; transmitting from said enterprise catalog system, a chart of accounts with descriptions, to a requisition catalog system database; an administrator of an enterprise selecting from said requisition catalog system database valid accounts with descriptions for a given commodity and purchase period, said description mapping account codes selected by said administrator to a given commodity code from an associated accounting system for use by a requester to select the valid general ledger account when doing financial validation on a requisition for commodities; said administrator then associating a selected account/description tuple with company commodity groups for use in subsequently creating the requisition for commodities; and creating the requisition for commodities with reference to a chart of general ledger account codes mapped to said commodity codes prepared and stored as digital signals in a chart of accounts database by the administrator of the enterprise, wherein said creating the requisition comprises: displaying to said requisitioner a commodity description document presenting a plurality of commodity descriptions and corresponding commodity codes: said requisitioner selecting a commodity code from said commodity description document and selecting from said chart of accounts database only those general ledger accounting codes appropriate for said selected commodity code; after said selecting from said chart of accounts database only those general ledger accounting codes appropriate for said selected commodity code, initiating a proceed to accounting process including presenting to said requisitioner a financial worksheet with valid general ledger accounts numbers and descriptions corresponding to said selected commodity code; responsive to said mapping, said requisitioner executing financial validation on the requisition for said commodities by selecting from said financial worksheet a general ledger account code mapped to said given commodity code; said requisitioner completing said creating the requisition by populating fields in said financial worksheet with properly designated general ledger accounting codes; and storing at an accounting ledger system digital signals representing said valid general ledger account.