accounts

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of account.

   All the firm's accounts were balanced before the auditors arrived.

   Survivors gave conflicting accounts of what happened that night.

   Note

   The plural gathers two families of meaning under one spelling. A firm's accounts are its records of debits and credits, or its bank accounts, and they get balanced or audited. Accounts of an event are narratives of it, and they conflict, differ or agree. Surrounding words settle which is meant. The same spelling also serves the verb form, as in she accounts for it.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of account.

   The new model accounts for changes in temperature over the course of a day.

   Each manager accounts to the board for the funds in their care.

   Note

   Most of this form's work is done with a preposition. Something accounts for a result when it explains it, and a person accounts to someone when they answer to them. The verb can also take a direct object to mean "consider": he accounts himself fortunate. The older use with a bare object, meaning "to answer for" something, is obsolete, so modern writing keeps the preposition.

   He accounts himself fortunate to have the work.

   The delay accounts for most of the extra cost.

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