Tips for Year End Closing in Microsoft Dynamics GP

Closing out the year in Dynamics GP requires a very specific set of actions to complete. Please refer to the Period and Year-End Best Practices for more details from our Dynamics GP 2018 Period-End & Year-End Closing Manual.

So in this blog, we’ll go over general tips for all year-end closings as well as specific tips for different GP modules.

Note: Be sure to have a current backup of both the company and Dynamics databases.

The first and most important task besides performing the close is making sure all users are out and you have a valid backup for each company. Backups should also be taken in between some of the closing procedures when it involves payroll or any other time consuming processes. Make sure to also safeguard your backups from any cleanup routines you may have setup in SQL server by keeping it in a different drive and folder.

The next thing to remember is to soft close all your periods for the year being closed from Fiscal Period setup. And if you don’t use a module, there is no need to close it. Lastly, be aware of timing, schedules and holidays especially when it comes to Payroll year end and Inventory physical counts. These involve coordination and installation of Tax Table updates that are time and order sensitive. Now we’ll look at some of the module specific tips for closing.

Inventory (Optional)

• Post all transactions in inventory, manufacturing, sales and purchasing for the year before closing Inventory
• Also run a reconcile of your inventory quantities in GP and perform a physical count for accuracy

Project Accounting (Optional)

• Run the final billings and revenue recognition on projects for the year. After you do this, Project Accounting and General Ledger will reconcile more quickly and easily
• Update the rate tables in the PA Position Rate Table Maintenance and PA Employee Rate Table Maintenance windows

Purchasing (Optional)

• Review 1099 transaction information to adjust vendors or individual transactions where needed (use 1099 smartlist and export to excel to validate amounts)
• Don’t forget to use your routine “Financial Reconcile to GL” to reconcile all of your sub ledgers

Sales (Optional)

• Save but don’t post any transactions for new year in a batch until current year is closed
• During year end close, select the “fiscal”, “calendar” or “both” but first make sure to set your system date back to December 31^st so that’ll be the date marked for date of close in GP
• Perform Tax Year End close if tax is being used anywhere

General Ledger (Required)

• Run through the Fixed Assets closing procedures
• Post all transactions from all modules for the year
• Verify that all of your new accounts are set to the correct posting type
• Confirm your financial statements in Management Reporter are correct

Payroll (Required)

• Run the Year End update on each workstation before performing the close to create wage file and install the next year tax table update as the last step
• If you need to make changes/edits to ensure W-2s are accurate after the year-end wage file has been created, you have a couple of options:
  • Option 1 - Manually Edit W-2's (most common)
  • Option 2 - Remove Year-End Wage File, Make Changes, and Recreate Year-End Wage File

Finally one last advice is to not stop any GP closing routines while its running even if it appears that your system isn’t responding. Some of these routines can take time as the system is still processing behind the scenes which could make it appear that nothing is happening. If you feel like these year-end processes or any activities related to GP are daunting, please remember that FMT is available to help.

We understands that your business is unique and won’t fit a pre-determined mold. So we can review and simplify the tasks to avoid the headaches that can happen. Simply reach out to us at 833-827-4276 or email us at marketing@fmtconsultants.com.