Period close

Period close is the governed process of proving that the accounting period is complete enough for the school’s approved close state. It combines period status, posting readiness, source-to-ledger tie-outs, exception review, approvals, and evidence. Clicking a close button is only the final state transition.

Audience: accountants, bursars, finance managers, period-control owners, approvers, auditors, and implementers
Learning time: 60 minutes
Navigation: Fiscal Calendar, Posting Controls, Month-end tie-out, Trial Balance, Statements, and Audit Readiness
Boundary: P5 proves internal accounting close. Bank/provider reconciliation procedures are published in P6.

Learning outcomes

You will be able to:

• distinguish open, soft-closed, and hard-closed periods;
• prepare a close using explicit prerequisites;
• create and review month-end tie-out runs;
• interpret balanced/unbalanced and pending/signed-off/rejected states separately;
• use diagnostics and dry-run remediation safely;
• apply maker/reviewer separation to sign-off;
• reopen only through exceptional governed correction.

Period and tie-out states

Accounting period states are open, soft_closed, and hard_closed. A tie-out run has review status pending, signed_off, or rejected, plus balance state balanced or unbalanced. These dimensions are independent: a balanced run can still be pending review, and a signed-off historical run does not prove current data is unchanged.

Prerequisites

Requirement	Evidence
Active fiscal year and target period	dates and state
Prior-period sequence	previous required periods hard closed or explained
Posting controls ready	active policy, mappings, no critical blockers
Source processing complete	billing, collections, expenditures, payroll and adjustments cut off
Trial balance reviewed	totals, unusual accounts, manual journals
Source-to-ledger tie-outs	receivables, payables, cash and other controls
Reconciliation evidence	configuration-dependent close prerequisite; P6 owns detailed procedures
Approval matrix	close, sign-off, and reopen actors
Stable snapshot	run ID, hashes/fingerprints, exports, timestamps

Roles and exact permissions

Action	Exact ability
View fiscal periods	cashbook_period:read
Create fiscal year/period design	cashbook_period:create
Activate fiscal year/policy	finance_control:manage_policy
View close readiness	finance_control:readiness or financial_process_setup:readiness by workspace
View exceptions	finance_posting_exception:list
Resolve exceptions	finance_posting_exception:resolve
Run trial balance/statements	gl:statements
View tie-out	month_end_tie_out:read
Create tie-out run	month_end_tie_out:run
Sign off tie-out	month_end_tie_out:sign_off
Reject tie-out	month_end_tie_out:reject
Close period	cashbook:close_period
Reopen period	cashbook:reopen_period

The current Month-end page also recognises broad Finance/Payment fallbacks. Treat the exact month-end abilities as the intended contract and record any mismatch.

Close sequence

1. Freeze the cut-off plan. Record source cut-off times, posting cut-off, expected late items, currency, and responsible owners.
2. Confirm period state. The target must be open for remaining governed postings.
3. Review posting readiness. Resolve missing policy, mappings, inactive accounts, and critical exceptions.
4. Complete source workflows. Finalise eligible invoices, Payments, refunds, expenditures, payroll, and approved adjustments.
5. Search for pending/draft journals. Decide whether each should post, be rejected, or move to the next period.
6. Run trial balance. Investigate imbalance, suspense, unusual balances, manual journals, and reversals.
7. Run month-end preview/diagnostics. Use the target as-of date, currency, and approved variance threshold.
8. Run dry remediation when missing journals are suspected. Review every planned, skipped, failed, and actionable candidate.
9. Apply only authorised remediation or repair. Preserve source identities and reversal lineage.
10. Create the persistent tie-out run. Record notes and snapshot evidence.
11. Independent reviewer signs off or rejects. A balanced result is necessary under the contract but does not remove reviewer judgement.
12. Soft close. Use when routine work should stop but approved corrections may still be required.
13. Complete remaining reconciliation and statement review.
14. Hard close. Only after approved final criteria are met.
15. Store the close pack. Include all identifiers and exports required by policy.

Month-end diagnostics and remediation

Diagnostics report account-level ledger balance, subledger balance, variance, unexplained variance, findings, suspects, recommendations, and caveats. Severity is critical, high, medium, or low.

Dry-run remediation evaluates candidate source records. It distinguishes planned postings, posted journals, no-posting-required, no actor, no Chart of Accounts mapping, and failed outcomes. Do not apply if the dry run includes unexplained source selection, wrong school, wrong currency, or unsupported accounts.

A repair workflow for an existing wrong journal is different from a backfill for a missing journal. Use reversal/compensation and retain approval.

Reopen procedure

Reopen changes completed evidence and must be exceptional.

1. Record the defect, affected documents, amount, currency, and why correction cannot occur in the current open period.
2. Obtain cashbook:reopen_period authority and required approval.
3. Preserve the original close pack and tie-out sign-off.
4. Reopen the minimum required period.
5. Post source-aware corrections.
6. Rerun trial balance, tie-outs, statements, and reconciliation checks.
7. Create a new close pack that cross-references the reopen reason and superseded evidence.
8. Hard close again through normal governance.

Worked scenario: Mupfure Learning Academy

At August close, Mupfure’s tie-out is unbalanced because two verified Payments lack journals and one fee adjustment has no mapping. Dry-run remediation shows the two Payments as planned and the fee adjustment as skipped_no_coa. The mapping is approved through maker-checker, simulation is rerun, and remediation is applied. The new tie-out is balanced and independently signed off.

The period is soft closed while the bank reconciliation owner completes statement matching. After the school’s configured close prerequisites pass, August is hard closed.

Accounting impact

Closing a period does not create balancing journals by itself. It changes the governance state controlling eligible posting dates. Tie-out remediation or repairs can create journals, but those actions require their own source, account, approval, and audit evidence.

Controls and audit evidence

The close pack should retain fiscal period ID/state history, readiness output, exception list, source cut-off evidence, trial balance, manual-journal review, tie-out preview/run, sections, thresholds, diagnostics, dry-run and apply results, approvals, sign-off/rejection, hashes, statements, reconciliation references, close actor/timestamp, and reopen history.

Failure modes

Symptom	Likely cause	Evidence	Safe action	Escalate when
close button blocked	readiness, prior period, exceptions, reconciliation, parity, or approval	named blockers and policy	resolve blocker	backend blocker contradicts evidence
tie-out balanced but sign-off unavailable	permission, same reviewer, or state issue	actor IDs and abilities	route to authorised reviewer	eligible independent reviewer denied
signed-off run no longer matches	source changed after snapshot	hashes, updated timestamps	create new run	product reuses stale sign-off
remediation posts unexpected candidates	wrong scope/methodology	dry-run items	stop and correct inputs	apply occurred despite dry-run mismatch
hard-closed period needs correction	prior error discovered	close pack and source evidence	governed reopen or current-period correction policy	no safe correction path exists
close relies on manual plug	root cause unresolved	journal source and tie-out	reverse plug and correct cause	signed-off evidence was misleading

Verification checklist

• Period and prior-period states are correct.
• Cut-off plan and owners are documented.
• Posting readiness has no unexplained critical blocker.
• Draft/pending journals are dispositioned.
• Trial balance is reviewed.
• Source-to-ledger tie-outs are complete.
• Diagnostics explain material residuals.
• Dry-run and applied results agree.
• Tie-out run is balanced under approved threshold.
• Reviewer is authorised and independent.
• Soft/hard close state is intentional.
• Close pack and hashes are retained.
• Reopen history is preserved.

Practice and knowledge check

Guided practice: execute a mock month-end from readiness through signed-off tie-out and soft close in a test school.

Independent scenario: a hard-closed period contains a duplicate manual journal. Compare current-period correction and governed reopen options.

1. What is the difference between period state and tie-out status?
2. Why can balanced and pending coexist?
3. What does dry-run remediation prove?
4. Which ability signs off a tie-out?
5. Why should the reviewer be different from the maker?
6. What must survive a reopen?
7. Does closing create accounting entries?

Answer guide: period and evidence workflows are separate; balance is computational while sign-off is review; dry run previews candidate effects; use month_end_tie_out:sign_off; separation reduces self-review; preserve original close evidence and cross-reference; close changes governance state, not ledger totals.

Next lesson

Continue to Financial statements.