Understanding the accounting information system saves much time to an accountant since the data entry processing time is minimized. In doing so, the accountant is saved much time that he/she can utilize to do other productive work in the office. The way this system works coordinates all the departments in the business firm. The daily operations are summarized with speed and the financial reporting becomes easy. If an accountant is well conversant with the system, his/her performance becomes easy to track and hence control checks are easier to install. Reporting by an accountant becomes even easier and such information helps management to make the right decisions since the system provides many schedules if demanded (www.highbeam.com ).
Due to the modernization through automation, business firms are changing their operations, for instance, the way internal controls are now being conducted. The auditors are demanding auditing firms through computers and hence with such, an accountant will have no choice but to get to understand the accounting information systems. The system has been seen to save costs and at the same time resulting into accurate information
(Ken, 2005).
A significant development in computing over the past twenty years has been the widespread adoption of relational database. Relational database is the way the database are grouped according to the attributes that are in the data set of our concern. This helps people to understand the data much easier since the data is now organized. For instance, a data set containing all the motor vehicles transactions in a country can be categorized by the year of manufacture; or the make of the vehicle; or by the color. Thus the data is grouped in more relational manner. Tables are now being used to display the information concerning personal details in the registration of persons department, car manufacturing companies and logistical information (www.highbeam.com ).
A revenue cycle is a department in a business firm that is charged with the responsibility of accepting customer orders, writes invoices and collects the receivables from the debtors. To demonstrate how the relational database works, we take the following table from the revenue cycle of a certain company which is used for data processing and at the same time used as the database for the debtors.