Question

On december 31, 2014, extreme fitness has adjusted balances of $940,000 in accounts receivable and $83,000 in allowance for doubtful accounts. on january 2, 2015, the company learns that certain customer accounts are not collectible, so management authorizes a write-off of these accounts totaling $24,000. assume that on february 2, 2015, extreme fitness received a payment of $1,900 from one of the customers whose balance had been written off. prepare the journal entries to record this transaction. (if no entry is required for a transaction/event, select "no journal entry required" in the first account field.)

Answer 1

To record the write-off of receivables:

Allowance for doubtful accounts ----------------------------$24,000
            Accounts Receivable -----------------------------------------------$24,000

To record the accounts receivable collected from the written-off receivable, first restore the accounts receivable with the following entry:

Accounts Receivable ------------------------------------------$1,900
           Allowance for doubtful accounts ------------------------------$1,900

To record the collection of accounts receivable:

Cash -----------------------------------------------------------------$1,900
           Accounts Receivable ----------------------------------------------$1,900

Or, the direct journal entry to record the collection of previously written-off accounts receivable is: 

Cash ---------------------------------------------------------------$1,900
          Allowance for doubtful accounts ------------------------------$1,900