# Categories

The Categories view provides a summary of all the existing categories in your current database. The categories are split into income and expense, sorted alphabetically, and shown along with the respective balance for each.

## Creating a category

There are 3 ways to create a new category: either select the Category New category menu item; select a parent in the tree in the Categories view, right-click and select the New Category option, or directly type the name of the new category when adding or editing a transaction in the Ledger. Doing any of these steps will direct you to the Create new Category dialog. The dialog contains three tabs: General, Hierarchy, and Tax. The General tab includes editable fields for the new category name, type, and currency (with the default currency preselected,) as well as options for Last check number, Notes, and a checkbox for Cost center assignment required. In the Hierarchy tab, you are able to select the appropriate parent account for the category. Finally, in the Tax tab, there are fields to enable and configure VAT support, and a checkbox to include this category in tax related reports.

## Editing a Category

To edit a category, right-click on a category name, and choose Edit category. A window appears with the same three tabs as the new category dialog: General, Hierarchy and Tax. Each tab allows you to edit certain details of the category.

The General tab allows you to edit the name of the category, any notes you entered when you created the category, the Last check number, and the state of the Cost Center assignment required checkbox. The Type, Currency, and Price entry cannot be changed from their initial values.

The Hierarchy tab allows you to change the parent category by clicking on another category in this view of the category hierarchy. In an earlier version of &kmymoney; it was possible to change the parent of a category by dragging and dropping. This functionality is expected to return in a future version of the application.

The Tax tab allows you to assign or change VAT details, or to alter the automatic VAT assignment. It also allows the ability to toggle whether or not the category is included in tax related reports.

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## VAT Support

You can turn an expense/income category into a VAT category, which means that it receives all the splits that actually make up the VAT payment towards the government. You can also enter a specific percentage rate.

Categories can be assigned a VAT category, which allows &kmymoney; to split a transaction for a category into two parts, one for the category and one for the VAT. Depending on the setting of the gross/net amount switch, the amount you enter for the transaction is the gross or net amount.

Example: In Germany, there are three VAT percentages (0%, 7%, and 19%). So I have a main category "VAT paid" and three subcategories, one for each percentage rate. I create these on both the income and the expense sides so that I have six categories in total. For the goods I buy, I select one of the above mentioned categories as the "VAT category assignment".

When I buy goods, I enter them into a transaction. Let's assume I have selected the gross amount entry method, once I enter the category and amount, &kmymoney; will recognize that there's a VAT assignment and calculate the VAT part, create a second split with the VAT account and VAT amount and reduce the category amount.

The same applies to income categories but the other way around. Hope that makes sense.

## Deleting a category

To delete a category, select it in the tree, right click to bring up the popup menu, and select Delete. If the category has no transactions, schedules, or budgets associated with it, it will be deleted.

If the category has any of those items, a popup will be displayed allowing you to choose another category to which all those items can be reassigned before the category is deleted.

If you delete a category which is the parent of any other categories, a dialog will be displayed for you to choose whether to delete that category and all its sub-categories or just the parent category. If you choose to just delete the parent category, then all its sub-categories will be moved to its parent category.

Note that deleting some categories may prompt both for where to reassign its data and also whether or not to delete any sub-categories.

## Open ledger for a category

By right-clicking on any category there is an option to open a ledger for that category. You can also double-click on the category. When this option is selected &kmymoney; will display a ledger with all the transactions for the selected category. This allows you to quickly review all the transactions in detail for the selected category. You can then right-click on any transaction to obtain additional details about the specific transaction ultimately allowing any editing that may be required. Note that you cannot edit a transaction in the Category ledger; you need to switch to the ledger display for the other account, using one of the selections in the popup menu when you right click on the transaction.