To your question, Cal's answer about how to get the reporting right is correct.

To a more general issue: The way you are doing this seems very difficult and
potentially troublesome--since entering a large number of splits is very easy
to screw up. More than once, I've accidentally cancelld a transaction like
this just before I entered ALL of those splits, thus necessitating retyping
it all in. For cases like this, it is generally considered "best practice"
to create a credit card account and enter the individual transaction in that
account one transactiona t a time rather tnan as one massive transaction
split a LOT. Then, when paying the bill, Transfer:[name of credit card
account in Money].

YMMV.

"Confused" wrote:

- quote -

Yes, I entered the returned mailbox as a negative expense with a minus (-)
sign. That is how the tally for the "Split" item box for all expenses on
that particular charge card was correct before hitting the "enter" button for
the check number that paid the charge card.

"Rich/rerat" wrote:

- quote -

Confused,
Did you enter the return mailbox as a negative (-) in the expense &
household columns? You should not have enter the refund as a positive in the
credit column.

So it should have looked something like this
Credit Expense Household Item
X $20.00 $20.00 2 Mailboxes
X -$10.00 -$10.00 Returned 1 Mailbox

Not:
Credit Expense Household Item
X $20.00 $20.00 2 Mailboxes
$10.00 -$10.00 Returned 1 Mailbox

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"Confused" <Confused[at]discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:0F352131-78DD-4020-B9E8-377EBB7D153D[at]microsoft.com...
When entering debits and credits from a charge card statement in the "Split"
box the tally at the bottom agrees with the charge card statement for all
expense catagories on that charge card statement. When a report is printed
out however the credits aren't applied against the debits and a false
expense
total for a category is printed. IE. I bought 2 mailboxes at Home Depot on
a charge card. I kept the large mailbox and returned the small mailbox for
credit. When the charge card statement was processed at the end of the
month
I entered the charge sale of the original purchase, and then the credit of
the return as another entry with a minus (-) sign. All numbers tallied
correctly in the "Split" items box at the bottom. When an expense report
was
printed out however the credit for the returned mail box was not applied
against the debits and the expense category of "Household" was incorrect. I
am now wondering how many monthly reports over the past year are in error.
What goes on with the report function ?

In microsoft.public.money, Confused wrote:

- quote -

To show negative expenses in a report such as "Transactions by
category", when you customize, make sure the Details tab chooses
AllTypes, rather than Payments.

When entering debits and credits from a charge card statement in the "Split"
box the tally at the bottom agrees with the charge card statement for all
expense catagories on that charge card statement. When a report is printed
out however the credits aren't applied against the debits and a false expense
total for a category is printed. IE. I bought 2 mailboxes at Home Depot on
a charge card. I kept the large mailbox and returned the small mailbox for
credit. When the charge card statement was processed at the end of the month
I entered the charge sale of the original purchase, and then the credit of
the return as another entry with a minus (-) sign. All numbers tallied
correctly in the "Split" items box at the bottom. When an expense report was
printed out however the credit for the returned mail box was not applied
against the debits and the expense category of "Household" was incorrect. I
am now wondering how many monthly reports over the past year are in error.
What goes on with the report function ?