These adjusting entries produce accurate financial books, which are the basis for correct financial statements. Since the goal is to create timely and accurate financial statements, any procedures that can be integrated into the daily operations will facilitate a quicker monthly closing process. Ideally activity should be recorded when it happens, rather than waiting until the end of the month. While this may seem straight forward, this is an area that can cause undue pain come month-end. Before we explore leading practices for optimization, let’s start by defining the month-end close process. Although a very labor and time-intensive task, financial closing is a crucial aspect for any business’s success.

Check expenses to see if they have been recorded in the correct accounts and in the correct period, and that accruals and prepaids are accurately reflected. While it’s unlikely that anyone will ever mistake closing the books for fun, it’s also true that the month-end close process doesn’t have to be the stuff of nightmares. During your month-end close process, you need to reconcile all of your accounts. To do this, match your records to your account statements from outside entries, such as the bank. Make sure your records for the month are accurate by performing a bank statement reconciliation.

However, there are solutions in place to shift those to a pre-approved model whereby purchase requisitions lead to the generation of purchase orders for indirect spend, allowing for control and visibility. Concerning contract performance, procurement can also look to their AP solution to see what stage of payment their existing contracts are in, and the proportion of spend per contract. The same steps may apply to amortized assets as well, such as goodwill, closing costs, or business startup costs. In most companies, there is a series of accruals that you must perform every month. You might pay payroll, for example, weekly or biweekly, which can cause you to overlap with the end of the month. You’ll need to calculate the portion of payroll expense you incurred in the month that just ended and make a reversing entry to payroll expense vs. accrued expenses.

Standard journal entries are adjusting entries that are made to the general ledger every month to balance account variances. These reports should be kept in packets, along with a printout of the journal entry, for documentation of the entry. The bookkeeper should prepare a list of all standard journal entries that need to be prepared during the month end close to ensure all entries are posted to the general ledger. Inventory counts should be performed monthly to ensure accurate inventory levels on the company’s books. These counts are exhaustive and count all inventory in the warehouse. Other company’s use regular cycle counts, which refers to counting small portions of the inventory at a time on a more frequent basis.

We always advise our clients to be especially cognizant of any adjustments that need to be made prior to the filing of the annual Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement. Board and committee minutes required for annual audits should also be approved and filed at this time, and any scheduled quarterly audits conducted. Given our “new normal,” many companies are also taking a closer look at their financial technology at the end of each quarter.

Getting Ready To Do A Month

Harold Averkamp has worked as a university accounting instructor, accountant, and consultant for more than 25 years. Notes ReceivableCheck if ending account balance agrees with the related loan amortization schedule. If you find any errors or areas of concern—such as overspending within a specific department—address them right away. This post is to be used for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal, business, or tax advice. Each person should consult his or her own attorney, business advisor, or tax advisor with respect to matters referenced in this post. Bench assumes no liability for actions taken in reliance upon the information contained herein. Visit our “Solutions” page to see the areas of your business we can help improve to see if we’re a good fit for each other.

Fixed assets are generally big-ticket items that readily convert to cash in the general ledger. Instead, they may generate expenses for your company in the form of repairs, depreciation , amortization , or impairment costs . For the purposes of the month-end closing process, you simply need to record any of these expenses that occur for each of your fixed assets. This process may be viewed by those outside the accounting department as time travel or financial legerdemain. Ideally, the month-end closing process should be fast and smooth and should take about three to four days to complete. A well-executed month-end close helps improve organizational performance. You can create a month-end checklist to ensure that the process runs smoothly.

• These papers show all adjustments and calculations as you reconcile all major accounts for the period.
• Soon account reconciliation and month and year-end closing procedures will be easy to handle and stress-free, which provides a myriad of benefits for remote employees.
• The accounts of the income statement are generally reviewed for reasonableness by comparing amounts to prior periods and analyzing ratios.
• If you follow the pre-ASC 606 revenue recognition standards, those commissions would be considered expensed as they are incurred.
• These reports will help isolate revenue that can be accepted for the month, and sales that need to be pushed to the next period.

As such, process integrity checks can be applied to make sure that all records are accounted for in financial statements. ‍Balance sheet reconciliations make sure that your balance sheet correctly reflects your financial position as it displays current value of assets and liabilities. It’s completed by comparing your general ledger to external accounts like a bank statement, or even to internal accounts like a sub-ledger. On top of the pressure to produce precise financial statements for the sake of stakeholders and management teams is the need to comply with SEC regulations. While banks and investors expect to review reports that are in accordance with GAAP principles, the SEC and IRS require faultless financial statements. Per a survey conducted by CFO of 2,3000 organizations, the bottom 25% of companies reported needing at least 10 days to execute the month end close process. Cash basis is an accounting method that is based on the cash coming into and out of a business.

Closing The Open Period

Keep these numbers in mind as you investigate bringing an FP&A platform into your finance department and continue your journey toward a faster, smoother month-end close. Financial Reporting Deliver key financial insights across the business. IRA Financial Reports reflecting financial information through the latest close are generally available the morning after the close is completed. Looking for the best rebate management software to help your organisation manage rebates? Accrued Payroll TaxLocate the payroll tax returns arranged for the coming month and tax payments made the following month for an existing month payroll. Make necessary preparations and adjustments.Find out if there are any obsolete inventory that you need to write off. You might need to monitor some types of inventory more than others.

• If you find any errors or areas of concern—such as overspending within a specific department—address them right away.
• In accounts receivable, accruals are used to report revenue earned during a given month that have not yet had their transactions recorded.
• Maintain the integrity of roles and access with role-based security aligned with your underlying applications.
• Integrated workflows ensure that tasks are completed in the correct order and in the most efficient timeframes, by removing the need for managers to waste time chasing up the completion of tasks.
• Intercompany – intercompany trade can represent a lot of transactions and a huge amount of work for the finance team, but you need to eliminate it from the results.

For example, if the current income statement shows the cost of goods sold as 86% instead of the normal 81%, the current month’s amounts should be investigated before releasing the financial statements. For example, when a bill is received, an expense entry is made in the income statement and a corresponding entry is made increasing accounts payable on the balance sheet. Paying the expense decreases cash and accounts payable on the balance sheet. Using software to track spending automatically speeds up this process, though it’s still important to double-check your records. Chances are, you probably don’t have time to record transactions every day. If this is the case, make sure you write down your purchases and organize receipts.

What Are Analytical Reviews?

You will need to account for some incoming cash for funds from loans, revenue, and invoice payments. Next, you will want to enter and record all payments you have made for the month to all vendors. Make sure you include all payments made by check, debit card, credit card, and cash. This process should also include double checking that you paid all outstanding invoices and bills. If you work in finance, you’ll probably agree that speeding up the headache that is the month-end close wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Who could argue with fewer days spent in consolidation, forecasting, and reporting? But a speedy month-end close isn’t just good for accounting—it’s also good for the business.

• As an “all hands on deck” endeavor, the close process goes faster the more people get involved.
• “Do I have a standardized, documented month-end process to follow step-by-step?
• These communications should include brief reminders as to exactly what needs to be done and a due date for completion.
• Review your accounts receivable to see if your customers are paying within the agreed credit term.

Back up your data using a reliable cloud-based system that can be stored securely. A clear month-end closing process improves your efficiency and reduces mistakes. We’ll get into how you can develop the management of your closing process. But first, let’s take a look at what the month-end close is, and the exact steps you might be taking.

Dont Forget Petty Cash

“Closing” is the process of advancing from one month or period to the next or from one year to the next. In most computerized accounting systems the periods are closed by executing a menu command. The accounting month end close checklist usually involves nothing more than entering the next month and responding to the program’s suggestion to print various month-end reports. Even after moving to the next month, many accounting systems allow the user to return to previous months to enter or edit transactions.

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Benefits Of Flux Analysis & Automation To Identify Reconciliation Problems

These closing procedures should not be days upon endless days of analysis of every small detail, particularly when those details have no impact on the company’s big picture or leadership’s decision making. Making this process longer than it has to be costs not only time, but also money. In your accounting software, make all additional entries for vendor prepayments, estimated expenses due, change in equity, depreciation, amortization and loan interest. You need to adjust properly, otherwise your starting balance for the next period will be off. A way to self audit your process is to check for items that should be on the balance sheet, showing up on the P&L statement, and vice versa.

This is a good time to review purchases for such exceptions and handle them proactively. If your organization makes purchases using a corporate credit card, it’s often a good idea to reconcile those statements early in your closing process as well.

Streamlining the process better prepares you in case of an audit, and for when tax season eventually rolls around (far too soon, might I add!). Your finance team should make a journal entry to record each of these transactions. But a more streamlined month-end close process leads to fewer mistakes across your entire accounting procedure. Manage month-end close activities on a regular cycle throughout the year and then prepare for an efficient year-end close process, starting with a review of our calendar of important dates and deadlines. Year-end close process and producing 1099s is no different than closing your sub-ledgers and your general ledger, just as you do at the end of each month. As an “all hands on deck” endeavor, the close process goes faster the more people get involved. But considering the high-cost and low-availability of accountants right now, hiring people to streamline the close doesn’t make sense.

Prepare a bank reconciliation to reconcile your bank account with your financial records. Bank reconciliations will also help you understand your cash situation and not overdraw your account. With a month-end closing checklist and a bookkeeping habit, you can scale the summit with ease and manage your finances well. More importantly, staying on top of your financial data will help you achieve your long-term business goals. Let’s say your company has earned $200,000 in revenue this month, in the form of customer purchases. Invoices have been issued, but payment isn’t due until the 15th of next month. So an accrual entry of $200,000 is added to record earned revenue, offset by a corresponding entry to the Accounts Receivable account.

Review Information Before Closing

In turn, this simplifies and streamlines a number of other accounting procedures, including month-end for each month to come and the annual version of month-end known as month end closing process year-end close. Produce accurate financial statements and reduce the time it takes to prepare your month-end close process reports by harnessing the power of technology.

Year End Close

It is clear that accounts payable plays an important role in the month and year-end procedures, as they hold much of the data that is crucial to close the books in time, with the correct numbers. There are still a lot of manual, semi-manual, and paper-based processes out there disabling AP, and the rest of the organization, to really streamline accounts payable and leverage the value of the invoice data. However, CFOs recognize the challenge, and a recent survey revealed over 92 percent of them are focused on digitizing AP processes within the next year. Multiple reconciliations are needed to be completed before a book can be deemed to be closed for a month.