Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act or process of accumulating; an increase.
  • noun Something that accumulates or increases.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The act or process of accruing; accretion.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun rare Accrument.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun An increase; something that accumulates, especially an amount of money that periodically accumulates for a specific purpose
  • noun accounting a charge incurred in one accounting period that has not been paid by the end of it.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the act of accumulating

Etymologies

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Examples

  • For a young participant, the cash balance accrual is ordinarily faster.

    Retirement Policy 2009

  • The decline versus the prior quarter was related to a lower bonus accrual, which is tied to company performance.

    Financial Sector and Stocks Analysis from Seeking Alpha 2009

  • I'm sure cash-basis accounting has a place somewhere in the world, but the vast majority of businesses adhere to another convention called accrual-basis, which says that revenue is earned and expenses are generated at the moment of the transaction -- not when cash changes hands.

    US Market Commentary from Seeking Alpha 2009

  • In the US, the largest capital market and borrower, even the most optimistic budget estimates foresee another decade of crushing deficits that will grow the official deficit by some $9 trillion and the real (i.e., "accrual" or "unofficial") deficit by perhaps another $20 to $30 trillion, once we account for growth in liabilities.

    Chris Martenson, Ph.D.: Prediction: Things Will Unravel Faster Than You Think Ph.D. Chris Martenson 2010

  • In the US, the largest capital market and borrower, even the most optimistic budget estimates foresee another decade of crushing deficits that will grow the official deficit by some $9 trillion and the real (i.e., "accrual" or "unofficial") deficit by perhaps another $20 to $30 trillion, once we account for growth in liabilities.

    Chris Martenson, Ph.D.: Prediction: Things Will Unravel Faster Than You Think Ph.D. Chris Martenson 2010

  • Then there was a gigantic accounting gimmick -- a shift from pay-as-you-go bookkeeping to something known as "accrual" accounting in the government's pension-guarantee and deposit-insurance funds.

    Decoding Bush 2008

  • Amgen (AMGN): Q1 revenues contained a $33 million "accrual," with an estimated "impact" of $200 million to $250 million for the year.

    BNET Articles Jim Edwards 2010

  • The House voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to authorize the DOT to award multi-year contracts for highway projects and a variety of other activities, a system of "accrual" accounting the agency used before a 2008 state audit concluded that it violated Georgia's Constitution.

    Jacksonville Business News - Local Jacksonville News | Jacksonville Business Journal 2010

  • Sonny Perdue and the State Transportation Board over whether the DOT has the legal authority to obligate the state to multi-year funding commitments using a system of "accrual" accounting.

    Dallas Business News - Local Dallas News | Dallas Business Journal 2010

  • Amgen (AMGN): Q1 revenues contained a $33 million "accrual," with an estimated "impact" of $200 million to $250 million for the year.

    BNET Articles Jim Edwards 2010

Comments

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  • "A financial stipend that is provided to the sales channel by the vendor or manufacturer. The accrual amount is a usually a percentage of the invoiced price of items sold to the channel partner over a set period of time (e.g. a percentage of the previous six month's sales)." --Webopedia

    March 12, 2009