What has to be on every trust ledger entry

An external examiner rarely finds a missing transaction. Trust money is banked, and banking leaves a trail on both sides. What they find is entries that happened but were not described: a payment with no reason, an electronic transfer with no account number, a receipt that does not say who handed the money over.

Each of those is a particular that rule 47 of the Legal Profession Uniform General Rules 2015 requires. None of them can be reconstructed a year later, which is why the only workable answer is a form that refuses the entry at the counter.

A ledger for each person in each matter

A law practice that maintains a general trust account must keep a trust account ledger containing separate trust ledger accounts in relation to each person in each matter for which trust money has been received by the practice.

Each person in each matter. Two clients on one conveyance are two ledger accounts, and the same client on two matters is two more. A single running list per client, which is how a spreadsheet naturally grows, is not a trust ledger.

The title of the ledger, kept up to date

The following particulars must be recorded, and kept up to date, in the title of a trust ledger account: (a) the name of the person for or on behalf of whom the trust money was paid, (b) the person's address, (c) particulars sufficient to identify the matter in relation to which the trust money was received.

The address is the one most often missing, because nothing in the day to day work needs it. It is needed twice: here, and on the trust account statement the client gets after 30 June.

"Kept up to date" is doing real work in that sentence. A client who moved two years ago has an address in the ledger title that is wrong now, and the rule is written in the present tense.

The particulars for each transaction

The following particulars must be recorded for each transaction in the trust ledger account: (a) the date of the transaction, (b) the appropriate reference number and transaction type, (c) particulars sufficient to identify the reason for the transaction, (d) the amount of money in the transaction.

Paragraph (c) is the one that gets skipped. A date, a number and an amount are all produced by the act of entering the transaction. The reason is the only one somebody has to type, and it is the only one that answers the question an examiner is actually asking: what was this money for?

"Settlement" is not particulars sufficient to identify the reason. "Balance of settlement funds, 12 Example Street" is.

Then a different set for each kind of transaction

Rule 47(3)(e) adds requirements that depend on what the transaction is. This is the part a general purpose accounting package usually cannot express, because it has one payment form for everything.

if the transaction type is: (i) a receipt: the provider of the amount and the date the amount was received if that date is different from the date of receipt

Two dates, not one. The day the money came in, and the day the receipt was made out, whenever they differ. A cheque handed over on Friday and receipted on Monday has to show both, and a system with a single date field quietly loses one of them.

(ii) a payment by cheque: the payee or, in the case of a cheque made payable to an ADI, the name or BSB number of the ADI and the name of the person receiving the benefit of the payment

A bank cheque is two names. The bank it is made out to, and whoever actually gets the money. Recording only the bank tells a reader nothing about where the client's money went, which is the point of the entry.

(iii) a payment by electronic funds transfer: the account name and number and the relevant BSB number of the ADI and the name of the person receiving the benefit of the payment

The full destination account, on the ledger, not only in the banking app. Most electronic payments out of trust fail this one, because the person entering it has already typed the account details into internet banking and does not see why they should type them twice.

(iv) a journal entry: the appropriate ledger reference, the name of the person on whose behalf the transfer was made and the matter description

A transfer between matters is two entries that have to name each other. Read either side on its own and you can still find the other.

Why this belongs in the form, not in a policy

Every one of these particulars is knowable at the moment of the transaction and unknowable afterwards. Nobody remembers in March which bank a bank cheque in October was made out to. A firm that relies on training and a checklist is relying on the busiest person in the office being careful on the day the settlement moved.

The alternative is a form that will not complete without them. In Diract, a trust receipt is refused without its Reason, its Type and who it is Received from, and every receipt and payment must name a matter. If the sender has no address on file, the form asks for it then and there, because the receipt cannot be issued without it.

A Bank Transfer payment asks for Account name, BSB and Account number, and is refused without the account it went to. A Bank Cheque asks separately for Paid to, meaning who the money is for, and Cheque payable to (bank). A transfer between matters records both sides. A cheque takes its number from the practice's cheque book rather than from whoever is typing.

None of that is stricter than the rule. It is the rule, moved from a policy nobody reads to the screen somebody is already looking at.

Checking your own ledgers

1. Open three ledgers at random and read the reason on every entry. Decide whether somebody who was not there would know what the money was for.
2. Find your last electronic payment out of trust. Is the destination account name, number and BSB on the ledger entry, or only in internet banking?
3. Find your last bank cheque. Does the entry name both the bank and the person who got the money?
4. Check that every ledger title has a client address, and that the addresses are current rather than the ones from the file opening form.
5. Look at any receipt made out on a different day from the day the money arrived, and confirm both dates are recorded.

If a trust account statement is the next thing on your list, the statements due after 30 June covers what rule 52 asks for and which ledgers can be left out.

This article is general information about the Legal Profession Uniform General Rules 2015, not legal advice, and does not take account of your practice's circumstances. It quotes rule 47 from the NSW version, current for 6 October 2023 to date, read on the NSW legislation website on 21 September 2026. The Uniform Law and these Rules apply in New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia; other states and territories have their own legislation. Where the rule introduces a list with a dash, the quotes above show a colon. Rule 47(4) and the rules on controlled money records are not covered here. Current as at 21 September 2026.