The principal ledger of a cost department in which all accounts of unfinished jobs and processes are recorded and made self-balancing. In so doing, the ledger contains a control account for each subsidiary ledger. This ledger is also known as job ledger, in which all material costs, wages and overheads for each job in process (work in process, WIP) are posted to the respective job accounts.

It is used to track the cost of goods that are currently being worked on but are not yet finished.