It’s coming up on the end of 2019—”close enough to smell the barn” as said where I grew up near Louisville, Kentucky—and, since most company’s fiscal calendars match the calendar year, want to make sure you have all the year-end-closing information in one place here.
Always remember that NexLAN provides FREE telephone and e-mail support toll free at 877-2NEXLAN or via support@nexlan.com. And if you don’t have our “Emergency Contact List” of all our cell numbers for off-hours assistance, then please contact us.
A question we sometimes get is, “Why close the fiscal year?” Until you do, you won’t have beginning balances on the Balance Sheet for the next fiscal year and, since there’s only a three-year posting window, if you get a whole year behind then you won’t be able to enter ANY transactions—which we see regularly from clients who aren’t actively using General Ledger in their installations. Yes, it’s true that once you’ve closed a fiscal period then the source transactions aren’t editable, but you can always post back so don’t confuse “closing” the period with “Posting Period Restrictions.” And the final reason to close is so that you can then post back into The Magic 13th Period of the prior fiscal year and not obscure the operational financial performance of your actual 12th period.
By far the best advice we can give is to MAKE A BACKUP OF THE COMPANY DATABASE AT THE END OF YOUR FISCAL YEAR!!! Even if you’re not closing the fiscal year, it’s INVALUABLE to have that snapshot for validating the Balance Sheet since the “as of” reports in the system can be adversely effected by back-dated transactions. This is easy for a geek to do from inside the Microsoft SQL Server Management Console, but our NexSQLBack utility makes it simple even for non-geeks, just a couple mouse-clicks—so please contact us in the next month if you don’t already have NexSQLBack installed.
Special considerations if you run Payroll in-house:
- Regardless of when your fiscal year ends, or even if you’re closing the fiscal year on/about December 31st, you’ll need to run <Housekeeping><W-2/1099 Year-End Closing> very near that date. This is usually done as part of the payroll tax update process.
- Speaking of which, AccountMate will be releasing the 2020 Payroll Tax Update in late December and clients usually have us install this. Rachel will be in touch soon for details on when is your last payroll of 2019 and first payroll of 2020 so we can schedule this update.
And here’s the nitty-gritty of the closing process for both video and reading-oriented learners:
- Closing the Period in AccountMate (appropriate for AccountMate 8, 9, 10 & 11)
This webinar presented the recommended procedures for closing the period in AccountMate 8 subsidiary modules. It also identified some common issues that may be encountered during closing and provided tips on how to resolve them. Watch or Read - Closing the Tax Year in AccountMate (appropriate for AccountMate 8, 9, 10 & 11)
This webinar discussed the steps to close the Payroll tax year in AccountMate 8. It also identified the reports affected by the tax year closing process. Watch or Read - Year-End Closing in AccountMate (appropriate for AccountMate 8, 9, 10 & 11)
This webinar focused on the requirements and procedures for closing the fiscal year in the AccountMate 8 General Ledger module. It also provided tips to help you effectively perform year-end closing. Watch or Read
Standing by in the cornfields to make your year end closing smooth!
Regards,
https://nexlan.com
Built-in Multilingual Functionality
We’re previously highlighted AccountMate’s built-in multi-lingual functionality for Spanish, and am happy to now announce the release of the French language pack—with a Québécois accent.
The language is definable on a per-user basis, so if Peter logs in he sees all menus and screen/report labels in English, while Pedro sees them in Español and Pierre sees Français. Yes, in the same AccountMate company at the same time!
Contact us if you’d like to implement this flexibility—which is available to customers with active software maintenance plans.
Tech Note: Understanding Inactive Customers and Inactive & Temporary Vendors
To keep your customer and vendor lists at a manageable size it’s possible to “inactivate” them, and for one-off payments to create one-time vendors. How to do so, and what transactions can then be recorded, is discussed in Article #1188: Understanding the Inactive and Temporary Customer and Vendor Status.
Tech Note: Maximizing the Table Browser & Exporter
Technical Tips
Version: AM11 for SQL and Express
Modules: AP, PO, RA
• PO Module Setup ► General (2) ► Default for New Vendor area
• RA Module Setup ► RTV Options ► Default for New Vendor area
■ ■ ■
Versions: AM11 for SQL and Express
AM9 for SQL and Express (MS903 or higher)
AM9 for LAN (LN902 or higher)
Q: I get the message, “Cannot change the Posted Batch # [xxx],” each time I tried to enter a Batch # in the Journal Entry Transactions function. I do not want to change the posted journal entry batch; I just want to view the attachment. How can I do this?
A: Perform the following to view the attachment of a posted journal entry batch:
- Access the Journal Entry Transactions function.
- Select the Amend Batch option.
- Click the Batch # Attachment button to display the View/Purge Batch # Attachment window. This window will list all JE batches with attachment(s).
- Select the Batch # and double-click to view the attachment.
- Replace Kit Component in the IC module
- Replace BOM Component in the MI module
Subscription Information
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