A magazine's chart of accounts should have separate accounts for advertising, newsstand, subscriptions, and other A/R.

This allows management to analyze each the A/R balances from each revenue stream separately. Lumping them into one account it makes it harder to identify the source of  problems in A/R aging resulting from an increase in returns from the newsstand or bad debts from advertising.

It also allows the business manager/controller to sit down with the advertising manager and collections manager to review their performance separately from that of the circulation manager.

The accounting department should maintain separate schedules by issue to account for any allowances and track actual returns/bad debt expenses vs. estimated expenses. Many publications do this using MS Excel templates.

A/R Accounts for Magazines