MediumFinance16 min

Posted expenses above the average

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Challenge

List posted expense debits larger than the average posted expense debit.

Business context

The controller wants outliers in the expense ledger. Voided rows and revenue credits are not expenses, and status values were typed in mixed case.

Instructions

Use ledger rows that debit an expense account and whose trimmed, lowercased status is posted. Return memo, txn_date, and amount_cents. memo is trimmed. Keep amounts strictly above the average of that same set. Sort by amount_cents descending, then txn_date.

Schema

accounts

id INTEGER · primary key
name TEXT
account_type TEXT · asset, liability, revenue, expense

vendors

id INTEGER · primary key
name TEXT · may include extra spaces
category TEXT · nullable

bills

id INTEGER · primary key
vendor_id INTEGER
amount_cents INTEGER
issued_on TEXT
due_on TEXT
paid_on TEXT · nullable
status TEXT · paid, open, void

ledger

id INTEGER · primary key
account_id INTEGER
txn_date TEXT
amount_cents INTEGER
direction TEXT · debit or credit
memo TEXT · nullable, may include extra spaces
status TEXT · mixed case: posted, Posted, POSTED, void

Sample rows

accounts
id	name	account_type
1	Cash	asset
2	Accounts Payable	liability
3	Sales Revenue	revenue

vendors
id	name	category
1	Harbor Office	Facilities
2	Northwind Cloud	Software
3	City Clinic Supplies	Medical

bills
id	vendor_id	amount_cents	issued_on	due_on	paid_on	status
1	1	180000	2025-01-02	2025-01-31	2025-01-20	paid
2	2	42000	2025-01-05	2025-02-04	2025-02-10	paid
3	2	42000	2025-02-05	2025-03-07	NULL	open

ledger
id	account_id	txn_date	amount_cents	direction	memo	status
1	4	2025-01-20	180000	debit	January rent	posted
2	5	2025-02-10	42000	debit	Cloud january	Posted
3	6	2025-01-28	250000	debit	Payroll	POSTED

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