what is over and short 
over and short often called cash over short is an accounting term that signals a discrepancy between a company s reported figures from its sales records or receipts and its audited figures the term also is the name of an account in a company s general ledger the cash over short account this term pertains primarily to cash intensive businesses in the retail and banking sectors as well as those that need to handle petty cash if a cashier or bank teller errs by giving too much or too little change for example then the business will have a cash short or cash over position at the end of the day an example of over and shortassume that i work as a cashier at a sporting goods shop i rang up a 95 pair of yoga pants correctly for 95 but i miscounted the cash i received for the pants the customer unwittingly gave me 96 for the purchase an error we both failed to catch the accounting system will show 95 in posted sales but 96 of collected cash the one dollar difference goes to the cash over short account the journal entry for this sale would debit cash for 96 credit sales for 95 and credit cash over short for 1 the opposite is true for transactions that produce cash shortages assume the same situation except that i receive 94 instead of 96 for the sale now cash is debited for 94 the sales account is credited for 95 and cash over and short is debited for 1 