An example of a self-balancing account is the

A self-balancing account is one that is designed to balance on its own, independent of the rest of the ledger system, by recording, in total, the same entries that are also posted individually elsewhere. The control account is the classic example: the Sales Ledger Control Account, for instance, is debited and credited with the totals of all transactions affecting debtors (total credit sales, total cash received, total discount allowed, and so on), taken straight from the books of original entry, so it can be balanced entirely on its own and its balance checked against the sum of the individual debtor balances in the sales ledger.

A creditors account or a debtors account, taken individually, is simply one person's account within a subsidiary ledger; it does not balance itself independently in the way a control account does, since it exists as part of a wider ledger that is reconciled through the control account. A suspense account is a temporary account opened only when a trial balance fails to balance, holding the difference until the underlying errors are found and corrected; it is not a permanent self-balancing device.

Examination reminder: "self-balancing" is the specific technical description of a control account; do not confuse it with the general act of any account eventually having a balancing figure.