Month-end close

What the checklist covers

• Bank, credit card and loan accounts reconciled to statements, with the differences explained rather than plugged.
• Accruals and prepaids posted, so costs land in the month they belong to.
• Deferred revenue recognised as it is earned rather than when it was invoiced.
• Work in progress valued where jobs span the month end.
• Intercompany balances agreed between entities before either set of books closes.
• Every remaining balance sheet account supported by a schedule, which is where the surprises actually hide.

The bank is the account everyone reconciles. The ones that quietly drift are the small balance sheet accounts nobody has looked at since incorporation, and they are exactly what an auditor or a buyer opens first.

What it changes at year end

A file closed monthly arrives at year end already closed. The adjusting entries are small, the questions were answered in the month they arose, and the corporate return costs less because there is nothing to reconstruct.

The opposite case is a year rebuilt in one sitting, where the adjusting entries are large enough to change what you thought the year looked like.

Who this is for, and who it is not

A good fit: a business with enough monthly activity that a year-end reconstruction is painful, and anyone whose reports currently arrive too late to act on.

Not a fit: a very low-volume company where an annual clean-up genuinely costs less than twelve monthly closes and loses nothing that matters. We say so on the first call rather than quoting for work you do not need.