What's the difference between a specific and a general bad-debt provision?

Specific provisions are per-invoice — you've identified a particular doubtful debt (customer in administration, 90+ days overdue with no contact) and provision against that invoice. General provisions are policy-driven percentages applied across your whole aged AR (e.g. 0/0/5/10/50% per bucket), capturing the statistical baseline you can't pin to any single customer. The two complement, not duplicate: the general calc nets active specific provisions out of net outstanding AR before applying the bucket percentages, so raising a £10k specific provision automatically reduces what the general policy would otherwise post. Both paths post to the same accounts — DR Bad Debt Expense (6800) / CR Allowance for Doubtful Debts (1190).

See: finance-bad-debts-specific, finance-bad-debts-general-provision