Don’t forget any of the details! The end of the year brings extra work for your business’ financial team. The additional year end requirements of wrapping up one year and starting the next can be overwhelming. This checklist will help keep you on track through this very busy time of year.
- Do you have the books for the prior year wrapped up? Do you need to consider changes in accounting practices to correctly reflect changes in your business processes?
- Have you recorded depreciation and amortization for the year? Have you recorded all your fixed asset additions and deletions for the year?
- Have you recorded anticipated income tax liabilities for Federal and all States you will need to pay taxes in?
- Have you reviewed your income statement and balance sheet to be sure that all account balances are correct? Do the final account balances “make sense?” The end of a year offers an opportunity to “clean up” your records. Are there account balances that have not changed all year? Should they have changed? Are there transactions that were recorded to the wrong account and they have been sitting all year waiting to be corrected? This is an excellent time to do that.
- Are all your Prepaid Expense accounts up to date? Did you expense the correct amount for the current year and have an asset remaining of the correct amount for the future year?
- Do you need to accrue a liability for any expenses that were incurred, but not yet billed to you or paid by you?
- Do balance sheet accounts balance to detail for Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable? Are there bad debts that need to be written off? Old balances that need to be cleared up? Is your bad debt allowance account a reasonable amount for the level of bad debt you have experienced?
- Have you completed a physical inventory? Did you adjust your books to reflect current inventory? This should include write-downs of obsolete inventory.
- Do you have your financial reports in place to meet the needs of your creditors and investors as well as your internal needs?
- Do your financials need to be reviewed or audited by a CPA to comply with your financing covenants? Have you scheduled that work? Do you have internal resources to support the work?
- Have you identified your tax preparation schedule for prior year taxes and have a resource that can provide the necessary information to your tax preparer?
- Have you planned for reporting and payment of payroll taxes including W-2 preparation and distribution?
- Do you need to prepare and distribute 1099 forms?
- Is your budget for the coming year complete? Does it align with your overall business strategy? Have you entered your budget into your accounting software? Did you prepare a cash flow budget for the coming year?
- Do you have reporting in place to determine if your actual results are matching your budget for the coming year?
- Do you understand your cash flow needs for the coming year and do you have financing in place to meet those needs?
