First Month End on sage

Portandy

Hi

Please can anybody help or give any advice.

I started a new job as an accountant for a company. I have spent the last few weeks getting to know sage.

My first month end is coming up and I was hoping some people could give me some advice on the steps to take to complete month end in sage.

Also what kind of dates do you set deadlines for?

Thanks for any advice.

columbia

Hi and welcome to the forums.

There is a month end facility within sage which you can run, it just depends how exactly your company is set up.

Personally I wait until the middle of the next month so I can be sure I have received all of the purchase invoices from suppliers, then I do the following reports instead;

Trial Balance
Bank Statements (I also run an excel cash book to check this against)
Bank Day Books Payments-I file with purchase day books to reconcile the VAT
Bank Day Books Receipts-I file with sales day books to reconcile the VAT
Sales Day Books - Receipts/Invoices/Credits-File together to reconcile the VAT
Purchase Day Books Invoices/Credits/Payments-File together to reconcile the VAT
Nominal Day Books (exluding no Transactions)
Sales Ledger Aged (Exclude Later Payments)-I check it balances to 1100 on the Trial Balance
Purchase Ledger Aged (Exclude Later Payments)- I check it balances to 2100 on the Trial Balance

I then run a vat return for the month (without reconciling it!), and cross reference my reports to check for any errors.

We usually only adjust the stock quarterly, but you may wish to do that monthly - assuming you have stock.

Also remember any accruals or prepayments you have.

Hope this is of some use to you.

Kind regards
Tracy

Portandy

Thanks Tracy.

Are the prepayments simply done as a journal, credit the expense and debit the prepayment? and vice versa for accruals.

I have seen the month end option but not used it yet as dont want mess anything up. Is it straight forward to us and how long will it take to do using this?

columbia

Hi

Yeah, I just do a journal. I must admit I have never actually used the facility within Sage. I just do the printouts I suggested. It takes me around an hour to print everything out, and I spend a couple of hours checking all the data and cross referencing it to the VAT printouts for accuracy.

Another thought, (I can't take the credit for this as another poster found the forum), but if you go to the following site there is a wonderful Sage forum, similar to these discussion forums. You can post any sage related questions. You have to register to post, but it doesn't take long.

www.sageforum.co.uk

Tracy

Kecak

Most people don't need to run the Month End routine within Sage 50 as it only performs a few functions anyway. It will clear your Month To Date turnover figure from within your Customer/Supplier, and post any automatic Prepayments/Accruals/Depreciation you may have set up.

If you're not on Accounts Plus or higher, the routine itself will only give you the option to clear the MTD turnover figure anyway.

As to what you might want to print out or prepare for your records, that's really up to you, but columbia seems to have that covered already.

If you want to check to see if any automatic Prepayments/Accruals are set up, just go into Modules>Nominal Ledger and see if there's anything at all in the appropriate section.

For Depreciation, it will only post journals (and decrease the Book Value) in any Fixed Assets you might have set up. Again, check Modules>Fixed Assets Register.

Hope this helps a bit.