Year End

Companies usually organise their accounts over a specific period of time, known as the financial year. This is usually a 12 month period, which is why Sage 200 is set up this way.

At the end of each financial year you need to make sure your accounts are up to date, get any information you need for statutory submissions and move Sage 200 into a new year.

When to run your year end

You should decide this with your accountant. Ideally, you should run your year end when you've posted all the transactions for your current year and completed all the year end tasks and checks. This doesn't have to be on or near the date that your current year ends. In Sage 200, you can process transactions that are dated in your new year, before running the year end process.

Things to consider

  1. You can only run the year end once, so make sure that you're ready.

  2. You don't have to run the year end on the last day of your financial year.

    You can run the year end process at any time. For example, if your financial year ends on the 31st December, you may not be ready to move your accounts to your new financial year until the end of January.

  3. You can post transactions dated in your new financial year before you run the year end.

    This is just the same as posting transactions into any Future period. The transactions will update your customer and supplier accounts but they are not posted to your nominal accounts until the period is opened. You can't open a period in a future year until you have run the year end.

    This mean that you can start processing for your new year whilst waiting to finish off the old one.

  4. You can't post usual transactions into a previous financial year.

    This is because all the accounting periods in your current year must be closed before you can move to a new financial year. Any transactions that are dated in your previous financial year will be posted to the first open period in the new year and therefore accounted for in your new year.

    We recommend that your make sure all your current year transactions are posted before you run the year end.

  5. If you do need to make adjustments to a previous year, you can post a previous year journal which updates the closing balances.

    These are likely to be adjustments provided to you by your accountant.

  6. This process may take some time to complete, depending on the amount of data you have.

    We recommend that you run the year end process at a quiet time or after hours.

  7. Are you consolidating several subsidiary companiesschools into a single parent companyreporting company? If so there are extra steps that you need to complete as part of the year end process. See Consolidation - Year end.

Preparation

Running the year end is a straight forward process as long as your accounts are up to date and you have completed the recommended tasks and checks.

The tasks and checks we've outlined below are those we recommend and are common to most businesses. However, you'll need to check with your accountant or auditor in case there are other things you need to do for your business.

Make sure your accounts are up to date

  1. Post all day to day transactions and allocate as much as possible.

    You don't have to allocate everything before the end of the year, although it is good practice. You can still allocate transactions even when they're posted in different financial years.

  2. Remember to post any transactions that you normally enter at the end of a period such as prepayments and accruals.

  3. Process your standing orders and direct debits up to the end of the year.

    You can't close a period until you've done this.

  4. If you use foreign currencies, revalue your bank accounts. This makes sure that your balance sheet reflects the correct bank balances and that any gains or losses due to currency fluctuations are reported on your profit and loss.

  5. Enter any correction journals that your accountant has given you. Don't forget you must do this before you close the relevant period.
  6. Reconcile your bank accounts. Although this is not essential, it is good practice.

Print and check your reports

Your accountant or auditor will usually let you know which reports you require. We recommend that you check the following as a minimum:

  1. Your final Trial Balance.
  2. Your Profit and Loss Income and Expense reports, CFR Balances report (maintained schools), SOFA report (academies), and Balance Sheet.
  3. Your Aged Debt and Aged Credit reports and reconcile them with your Debtors Control and Creditors Control accounts.
  4. Print any other reports that you want to keep for your records. You may want to check with your accountant or auditor which reports are required.

Year ends for your funds

  1. As part of the year end process, the remaining balance of any of your funds needs to be transferred to a balance sheet account. This is account specified as the default for Accumulated Fund Profit.
  2. The remaining balance for each fund is transferred to the accumulated fund profit account with the corresponding cost centre. If these accounts don't exist when you run the year end, then Sage 200 creates them for you.
  3. If you're an academy, you must also add the SOFA category for Funds brought forward to each account. This is to make sure your brought forward funds are included on the SOFA report.

    1. Create an account for Accumulated Fund Profit. This account should have:

      1. The same report category that you use for Retained Profit, e.g. BS23 - Reserves.
      2. If you're an academy, a SOFA category of SX99 - Funds Brought Forward.
    2. Set this account as the default for Accumulated Fund Profit (Settings > Cash Book / Nominal Ledger > Default Nominal Accounts | Balance Sheet).

    3. Create additional accounts with the same code, for each of your cost centres. A quick way to do this is to use the Generate Accounts screen. (Nominal > Create and Amend Accounts > Generate New Nominal Accounts)

      Account Code Cost Centre Fund Type Report Category Report category Type SOFA Category
      3300 CIF Restricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 EFA Restricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 FAF Restricted Fixed Asset BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 GAG Unrestricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 RES Restricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 SEN Restricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward
      3300 UN Unrestricted BS23 - Reserves Balance Sheet SX 99 - Funds Brought Forward

Year end process

  1. Close your accounting periods.

    All accounting periods in the current year must be closed before you can move into the next financial year.

  2. Back up your data.
  3. Run the year end option. See Run the year end

What does the year end do?

  1. Checks to make sure you've specified an account for Accumulated Fund Profit for each of your funds (cost centres).

    If these accounts don't exist Sage 200 will create them for you.

  2. Transfers your profit (or loss) for the year to the Accumulated Profit nominal account.

    A report is produced that shows how this has been calculated.

  3. For profit and loss nominal accounts:
    1. The Year to date balance is set to zero.
    2. The Balance this year is set to zero.
  4. For balance sheet accounts:
    1. The Year to date balance is carried forward to the new year.
    2. The Balance this year figure is moved to the Balance last year.

  5. Produces a transaction that transfers the remaining balance (based on transactions marked as part of the financial year) in each of your funds to the Accumulated Fund Profit account with corresponding cost centre.

  6. Moves your financial year forward.
  7. Resets your current periods to 1.

  1. Transfers your profit (or loss) for the year to the Accumulated Profit nominal account.

    A report is produced that shows how this has been calculated.

  2. For profit and loss nominal accounts:
    1. The Year to date balance is set to zero.
    2. The Balance this year is set to zero.
  3. For balance sheet accounts:
    1. The Year to date balance is carried forward to the new year.
    2. The Balance this year figure is moved to the Balance last year.
  4. Moves your financial year forward.
  5. Resets your current periods to 1.
See also

Steps in this task

Close accounting periods

View closed period balances

Back up your data

Run the year end

Other tasks

Process standing orders and direct debits

Revalue a foreign currency bank account

Create journal entries

Bank reconciliation

Related information

Enter or change default nominal accounts

About the SOFA report

Financial reports

Consolidation - Year end