Marshalling numbers can be problematic. Business documents, and especially Invoices, need to take into account the potential of rounding errors when making calculations. The JSON RFC dictates that numbers should be represented as integers or floats, without any tailing 0s, which matches expectations with most programming languages. This is fine for mathematical problems, but can very easily lead to rounding errors when trying to convey monetary values or rates with a specific level of accuracy. GOBL will always parse and serialise amounts and percentages as strings to avoid any potential issues with number conversion. In effect, numbers are not allowed in GOBL documents except for specific use-cases such as counters or indexes. Single mathematical operations such as multiplication and division are performed using floats and then rounded using the standard Go math package to maintain the original precision. Amounts therefore:
  • Contain a single optional decimal place always represented with .
  • In libraries will be stored in memory as integers, and converted to floats for atomic maths operations if needed.
  • Have tailing 0s to determine the significant digits, e.g. 1.000 implies we’re dealing with an integer value of 1000, and thus an accuracy of three decimal places.
  • When performing arithmetic will always convert the incoming amount’s value to have the same exponential as the base.
  • Does not include support for exponential values in output, like 2.0e10, as amounts are typically used for consumption by humans and not complex mathematical calculations with large numbers.
Percentages use the same base as amounts, but:
  • Require a % symbol at the end of the serialised value, for example 10.0%
  • Will always be converted with a factor of 100, so 16.0% implies an underlying value of 0.160 or 160 as an integer, in order to make calculations.
The GOBL num package contains implementation details and helper methods for dealing with amounts and percentages.