At the admission of a new partner, old goodwill appearing in the books is written off among whom?

Correct answer: Among the old partners in the old ratio

The governing treatment is that goodwill already appearing in the books belongs to the existing partners because it was created before the new partner’s admission. When a new partner is admitted, this old goodwill is written off by debiting the old partners’ capital or current accounts in their old profit-sharing ratio. It is not distributed to the incoming partner, because the incoming partner did not earn or contribute to the historical goodwill represented by that balance. It is also not a bank transaction, so no bank account is involved merely because the balance is written off. Therefore option A is correct. The new ratio is relevant to future profit sharing, not to writing off old goodwill.