I am the accountant. I'm a CPA and this doesn't make any sense to me. It seems to be a system error. You can't have a balance in one account from one perspective, and a zero balance in the same account from another perspective. Any journal entry I might post may zero out the account from the balance sheet/trial balance perspective, but the ledger will still show a balance.
We are trying to close this account, but this is only possible if the balance is zero from the ledger perspective. When I post a journal entry to zero out the account from the balance sheet/trial balance perspective as you suggested (thus creating a balance on the ledger), then make the account inactive, QuickBooks creates an entry to put the money back in the ledger so that the balance is zero from the ledger perspective and can then be closed. It's a vicious circle.
This is a systematic issue that needs a resolution. Is there some process that needs to be run to close out gains from foreign currency exchanges that I'm not aware of? I see complaints above dating back multiple years with no solution. Please find a solution. Telling us to seek out the advice of an accountant is a cop-out. Most of us are accountants. This is a systematic issue that QuickBooks should be able to solve.
