Permissions related to Accounting Period management
Prior to accessing accounting period management, relevant permissions need to be assigned to the Roles.
- Edit or Full level of the Manage Accounting Periods permission is required to set up, edit, lock transactions for the period close, or reopen accounting periods.
Users with the View level of this permission can see the Manage Accounting Periods page but cannot make changes to periods.
When a journal entry, intercompany journal entry, statistical journal entry, or commission transaction has no defined posting period, users with View level of the Manage Accounting Periods permission see a suggested accounting period in the Posting Period field on the transaction. For example, if January is a locked accounting period, an A/R Clerk with View level of permission would see the suggested posting period as February. An administrator with a Full level of permission would see the suggested posting period as January.
For the following transactions, users with View level of the Manage Accounting Periods permission do not see a suggested posting period when there is no defined accounting period: Cash Sale, Check, Credit Card Charge, Credit Card Refund, Customer Refund, Credit Memo, Customer Payment, Deposit, Expense Report, Inventory Adjustment, Invoice, Item Fulfillment, Item Receipt, Transfer, Vendor Bill, and Vendor Payment. - The Override Period Restrictions permission is required to add and make general ledger-impacting changes to posting transactions in periods that have been locked to transactions.
Users must have both of the above permissions in addition to task-specific permissions to complete Period Close Checklist tasks such as automated intercompany adjustments, open currency balance revaluations, and calculation of consolidated exchange rates.
- The Setup permission ‘Allow Non-G/L Changes’ permits changes to posting transactions in locked or closed periods under the following conditions:
1. The Allow Non-G/L Changes box is checked on the period record.
2. The change does not impact the general ledger. - No one can make changes to posting transactions in a closed period if the changes would impact the general ledger. The period must be reopened before these changes can be posted.
- Permission restrictions do not apply to the addition or editing of non-posting transactions such as Sales Orders or Return Authorizations.
Navigation to Accounting Period Management:
Setup -> Accounting -> Manage G/L -> Manage Accounting Periods
Setting up of period
We have the option of setting a full year, new year, a new quarter, and new base period.
The Financial year period is termed as ‘Year’.
The Quarter which is a sub-period under FY is termed ‘Quarter’.
The months or relevant sub-period of the Quarter is termed the ‘Base period’.
- When we set up a full year, automatically corresponding quarters and base periods are created.
- When we set up a quarter or base period, we need to assign the ‘Sub-period of’ field.
- Setup of Year – The details to be filled in while setting up are the Year name, Start date and End date. The Inactive checkbox is also available to mark the year inactive.
- Setup of Quarter – The Quarter name, start date, and end date are available similar to the setting up of the year. In addition, the ‘Sub-period of’ field which is a mandatory field is also available and lists out all the years already set up.
- Setup of the Base period –
> Base period name
> Start date
> End date
> Sub-period of – selection list includes all quarters and years already set up.
> ‘Allow Non-GL changes’ checkbox – allows users with the Allow Non-G/L Changes permission to enter non-posting transactions to this period after it has been closed.
Note: Users who do not have the Allow Non-G/L Changes permission cannot enter non-posting transactions to a period even if the Allow Non-G/L Changes option for a period is checked.
> Period is Adjustment checkbox – This field identifies if an accounting period is an adjustment period. Adjustment periods are sometimes used for making adjustments at the end of a period, quarter, or year. For example, you can use adjustment periods to make special tax adjustments without impacting a base period, post year-end impairment for assets, make adjustments for management reporting, etc.
You can only enter journal entries in adjustment periods. Adjustment periods do not appear in the Posting Period field on other transaction types such as invoices, vendor bills, or sales orders.
Expand and Collapse periods
The (+) icon indicates Expand and the (-) icon indicated collapse.
We have the option of expanding and collapsing individual periods or altogether.
Closing Accounting Periods
For each base period, there is a checklist available. A checklist is a list of tasks to be completed to close a period.
> Besides the base period, click on the checklist icon.
Note: A base period can only be locked if all prior periods are closed.
> On opening the checklist, we can see the period name, start date, end date and status of the period. The period will be in Open status until all tasks in checklist are locked.
Locking a task:
- Click on the Go to task icon.
- Click on Mark All button and click Submit.
- Initially, the task status would be unlocked. On closing all subsidiaries, it would change to Locked. If any subsidiaries are not closed, the status would be In Progress.
- On closing a task, a green tick mark would appear in the status column on the task list page against the relevant task.
- The locking of the G/L posting transactions is prioritized first. Only after closing the A/R, A/P, and Lock All would the next tasks for locking be active. Each subsequent task has a prerequisite task that needs to be locked in order for the task to be unlocked for closing. The final task is closing the period.
- The tasks to be locked depend on the features enabled in the account. For instance, Revalue Open Foreign Currency Balances and Calculate Consolidated Exchange Rates tasks will only be present if the multiple currency feature and related features are enabled.
- A/P Transactions and A/R Transactions – lock indicates that ordinary users cannot post A/P or A/R transactions in this period.
- On locking A/R, A/P and Lock All, the next tasks available for locking are Resolve date/period mismatches and Revalue Open foreign currency balances.
- To Lock the ‘Resolve date/period mismatches’ task, click on the go to task icon, then select the Resolve Date/Period Mismatches button. Then click on ‘Back to Period Close’ and click on ‘Mark Task Complete’.
- As shown above, not all tasks can be marked complete directly. Rather there might be a need for revaluation or reconciliation of records before marking tasks complete.
Reopening and making changes in the accounting period
- In order to reopen a period, we need to unlock the period close task. Click on the Checklist icon beside the base period, then click on the Go to task icon beside the ‘Close’ task. Enter a reason for reopening the period in the Justification column and click on the ‘Reopen Period’ button.
- Reopening will mean reopening all subsequent periods (however they will remain locked). We would also have to work down the checklist to close this and any subsequent period when we decide to close them.
- To unlock a posting transaction task like ‘Lock A/R’, we need to select unmark all and click Submit.
- To unlock other tasks, we need to click on Mark task in progress.
- Changes to addresses are not permitted in a closed accounting period as these may alter the tax rules and affect the GL
Delete Periods
- A base period can only be deleted if there are no transactions posted in it. If a transaction is posted to it, the period can only be deleted after changing the posting period of the transaction.
- A quarter can only be deleted if the base periods under it have no transactions posted. When a quarter is deleted, its related base periods are also deleted.
- A year can only be deleted if it has no sub-periods [like a quarter or base period] or if the related sub-periods have been deleted.
- The period cannot be deleted if it is a closed period
- Periods cannot be deleted if it has sub-periods with transactions posted to them.
Quick close feature
- The Quick Close preference enables you to close one or more accounting periods with a single click.
- This time-saving preference is useful when you have reopened one or more closed accounting periods to make a change. With Quick Close, NetSuite marks complete all tasks in all reopened accounting periods, eliminating the requirement to close them one by one.
- The Quick close feature needs to be enabled to perform this function. For that, navigate to Setup -> Accounting -> Preferences -> Accounting preferences. Under the General Ledger section in the General tab, enable the ‘Allow Quick close of accounting periods’ feature and click Save.
- The quick close feature on enabling is automatically granted permission to administrators. Other users have to be given the period closing management permission and setup permissions required for closing tasks.
- To close multiple periods, click on the Close Multiple Periods button and enter the period up to which you need to close. Then click submit.
