Unidentifiable Variance in Suppliers

System verification report showed a supplier variance. When comparing with the aged trial balance and the supplier verification report the variance kept changing dramatically and continued getting worse the further back we ran it for.

Found that the variance total displayed in the system verification report matched the outstanding balance for one supplier account. There were no transactions out of balance in this account however the Sort Key field for this supplier had a strange Ÿ character in it.

Looking at the table in the background shows a dark line in the field.

In the supplier details screen - Overtyping the sort key with the correct Sort Key, identified from an earlier backup or supplier report, and saving will clear the variance.

 It’s hard to say exactly how a character like this ended up in this field.

However, as the Sort Key field is only locked and greyed out when the setting “Automatic Sort Key Creation” is on, it is possible and relatively easy for a user to accidentally paste or type something into this field and click save without realising when the setting is not on.