Fiscal periods and period close

A fiscal period is one month of a company's fiscal year, and its status — Open, Closed or Locked — decides whether anything can still post into that month. Periods are created from the fiscal year; this page covers what happens to them afterwards: reconciling the month, checking the period's ledger, closing it, reopening it for an approved correction, and locking it once the figures are final.

Overview

Every journal in xMatix — a manual entry, or the journal an invoice, bill, payment, expense claim or stock movement generates — belongs to exactly one fiscal period: the period of the journal's company whose start and end dates cover the journal date. Other finance records also refer to a period, among them revenue recognition schedule lines, budget lines and payroll periods.

A period moves through three statuses:

Each period record also carries two ledger tools: Verify Ledger, which checks the period's stored balances against the posted journals, and Rebuild Balances, which recalculates those balances from the posted journals.

When to use it

• Month-end — once a month is reconciled, close its period so nothing more can post into it.
• An approved late entry — reopen a Closed period, post the correction, and close it again.
• Final sign-off — after audit or a statutory filing, lock the period so it can never be reopened.
• Before trusting a balance — run Verify Ledger when a trial balance or party balance for the month looks wrong, and Rebuild Balances when it reports drift.

How xMatix handles it

• The date picks the period. You never choose a period on a document. When a journal is saved or posted, xMatix finds the period of the journal's company that covers the journal date. A period with no company applies to every company; when both exist, the company's own period wins.
• Two gates. Posting needs an Open period inside a fiscal year whose own Status is also Open. Either one failing stops the save or the post with a message naming the period.
• Drafts get their period on save. A new journal, or a journal whose date changes, is given its period when it is saved, and posting looks the period up again from the final date. A draft whose date is unchanged keeps the period it already has, so editing the narration of an old draft is not blocked by a period closed since.
• A missing month is filled in for you. If a posting date has no period at all, xMatix creates an April–March fiscal year for the company with twelve Open monthly periods and posts into it. It never reopens a Closed or Locked period to do so.
• Actions move the status. Close Period (Open → Closed), Reopen Period (Closed → Open) and Lock Period (Open or Closed → Locked). Every action updates the period's fiscal days to the same status.
• No built-in close checklist. Close Period changes the status only. It does not check for draft journals, failed postings or unreconciled banks — that review is yours to do before you close.

How period balances are stored

Alongside the journals, xMatix keeps two sets of running totals for each period. Verify Ledger and Rebuild Balances work on these totals.

• GL Period Balance: one row per GL account in the period for each combination of branch, business unit, GST registration, cost centre and reporting subtype (for example a CGST or SGST bucket). A blank branch or business unit counts as its own combination.
• Party Period Balance: one row per customer or supplier under each control account (receivables, payables and any other account marked as a control account) in the period and business unit. Only lines that post to a control account and name a party are counted.

When a journal posts, xMatix adds each line's debit or credit to the matching rows and creates a row the first time a combination appears. A reversal posts the opposite amounts into the period of its own date. When the original and the reversal fall in the same period, the row shows both Period Debit and Period Credit raised; they don't go back to zero. Nothing else writes these rows: creating, editing, cloning or deleting them from a screen, an import or a data sync is refused.

Statements that cover whole periods (Trial Balance, P&L, Balance Sheet and the statements broken out by branch, business unit, GSTIN or cost centre) add these rows up across the periods they cover. The opening position is the sum of all earlier periods. A date range that starts or ends partway through a period reads the journal lines for the part-period days. If the stored totals drift from the journals, every statement for that period and for later periods is off by the same amount until you rebuild. Customer and supplier ledgers and ageing are worked out from the journal lines and open items, not from the party rows.

Prerequisites

• The fiscal year and its periods exist — see Fiscal years and periods.
• Your security profile has permission on Fiscal Period and grants the period actions you need (see Permissions).
• The Close Period, Reopen Period, Lock Period, Verify Ledger and Rebuild Balances buttons are on the fiscal period record page. The page that ships with xMatix shows only Edit and Delete in its header; an administrator adds the period actions to the layout once (see Configuration).

Procedure

Step 1 — Finish and reconcile the month

Before you close, make sure the month is complete:

1. Post every document and journal dated in the month, and deal with any journal still in Draft — post it, re-date it or delete it.
2. Resolve failed postings. If automatic posting is switched on, check the Posting Error Log for Pending entries: Close Period does not check it for you.
3. Complete the month's bank reconciliation.
4. Tie the receivable and payable control accounts to their open items (see AR and AP subledgers), and review open expense claims and advances.
5. Post the month's inventory valuation adjustments, if you run them.
6. Keep the reports you relied on, with the date you ran them, so a reviewer can reproduce the result later.

Step 2 — Verify the period's ledger

1. Open the fiscal period record — for example Apr 2026 of your fiscal year.
2. Check its Start Date, End Date, Fiscal Year and Status (Open).
3. Select Verify Ledger.

xMatix re-adds the posted journals of the period and compares them with the stored figures. The result reports:

• how many GL balances it checked and how many did not match;
• how many party balances it checked and how many did not match;
• how many posted journals do not balance (debits not equal to credits);
• how many open items have an open amount that differs from their original amount minus their posted allocations;
• a list of the first 100 findings.

Verify Ledger changes nothing. The open-item check covers all open items, not only the ones dated in this period.

Step 3 — Rebuild balances if Verify Ledger found drift

If GL or party balances are reported as mismatched, select Rebuild Balances on the same period. xMatix recalculates the period's GL and party balances from its posted and reversed journals, saves them, and then runs Verify Ledger again and shows that result. Mismatches should now read zero.

Rebuild Balances does not change journals, and it does not correct open-item amounts or unbalanced journals — those findings need the source document or journal fixed.

What a rebuild does to the stored rows:

• It reads every posted or reversed journal that belongs to the period, whatever the period's status, so it also works on a Closed or Locked period.
• A row that matches the journals gets its Period Debit, Period Credit and Closing Balance rewritten.
• A row that no posted journal supports any longer is set to zero, not deleted.
• A missing row is created.
• Opening Balance is left as it is.

Rebuilding one period does not touch any other period. If several months show drift, rebuild each one.

Step 4 — Close the period

On the period record, select Close Period. The Status becomes Closed, and the period's fiscal days become Closed too. From now on any document or journal dated in the month is refused.

Close Period works only on an Open period. On any other status it stops with Period is Closed; only Open periods can transition to Closed. (the message names the current status).

Step 5 — Reopen for an approved correction

If a valid entry still belongs in a Closed month:

1. Get the correction approved under your close policy.
2. On the period record, select Reopen Period. The status returns to Open.
3. Post the correction, repeat the checks from Steps 1 to 3, and select Close Period again.

Reopen Period works only on a Closed period. A Locked period cannot be reopened.

Step 6 — Lock the period after final sign-off

When the month's figures are final — after audit or filing — select Lock Period. An Open period is closed and locked in one step; a Closed period is locked directly. The status becomes Locked and stays that way: xMatix refuses any later change that would move it out of Locked, whether by an action or by editing the record.

Step 7 — Close the year

Year-end is a separate step on the fiscal year, not on a period: Close Year posts the closing journal on the last day of the year, so run it while the last period is still Open, then close and lock the remaining periods. See Fiscal years and periods.

Fields

The fiscal period record page shows Partner Account in the header, then two panels.

The New form for a period asks for Fiscal Year, Partner Account, Start Date, End Date and Period Number. Normally you do not add periods by hand; Generate Periods on the fiscal year creates them all.

Period balance records

The GL Period Balance and Party Period Balance records are read-only in practice: every value comes from posting or Rebuild Balances. Their record pages show these fields.

The GL Period Balance and Party Period Balance references list every field.

Business rules

• Only Open accepts postings. A document or journal dated in a Closed or Locked period is refused when it is saved or posted.
• The year gates too. An Open period in a fiscal year whose Status is anything other than Open also refuses postings.
• Transitions. Close Period: Open → Closed. Reopen Period: Closed → Open. Lock Period: Open or Closed → Locked. Each refuses any other starting status.
• Locked is final. Any change that would move a period out of Locked is refused with A locked fiscal period cannot be reopened.
• Delete only Open periods. Deleting a Closed or Locked period is refused with Closed or locked fiscal periods cannot be deleted.
• Fiscal days follow the actions. Close, Reopen and Lock set the period's fiscal days to the period's new status.
• Editing Status directly is not checked like the actions. Only a move out of Locked is blocked, and the period's fiscal days are not updated. Use the actions so the days stay in step.
• No overlap check. xMatix does not stop two periods for the same company from covering the same dates. Keep each company's periods back to back.
• Balances only change through posting. The stored GL and party balances of a period are written by posting and by Rebuild Balances; they cannot be edited directly.

Example

Riverbend Textiles closes its books by the fifth working day of each month.

1. On 4 May the accountant posts the last April supplier bills, deletes two abandoned Draft journals, and completes the April bank reconciliation.
2. They open the period Apr 2026 and select Verify Ledger. The result shows 214 GL balances checked with 1 mismatch. They select Rebuild Balances; the repeated check shows 0 mismatches.
3. They select Close Period. Apr 2026 now reads Closed.
4. On 9 May a sales invoice dated 29 April is refused with Fiscal period 'Apr 2026' is Closed — posting is not allowed. The finance lead approves a late entry; the accountant selects Reopen Period, posts the invoice, reruns Verify Ledger and closes April again.
5. After the quarterly filing in July, the finance lead selects Lock Period on April, May and June.

Training

Practice exercise

In a sandbox with a fiscal year whose periods are generated, and with the period actions added to the period page:

1. Open the first period of the year and select Verify Ledger. Expected result: a summary of balances checked, mismatches and findings; nothing changes.
2. Select Close Period. Expected result: Status Closed.
3. Try to save a manual journal dated in that period. Expected result: it is refused because the period is Closed.
4. Select Close Period again. Expected result: a message that only Open periods can transition to Closed.
5. Select Reopen Period, then save the journal. Expected result: Status Open, and the journal saves.
6. On a period you will not use again, select Lock Period, then try Reopen Period. Expected result: the reopen is refused.

Quick reference

• The journal date and company pick the period; you never choose it.
• Only an Open period in an Open year accepts postings.
• Close Period: Open → Closed. Reopen Period: Closed → Open.
• Lock Period: Open or Closed → Locked, and Locked is final.
• Close Period runs no checks — reconcile first.
• Verify Ledger checks and changes nothing; Rebuild Balances recalculates the period's balances.
• Only Open periods can be deleted.
• Use the actions, not Edit, to change a period's status.

Permissions

Access is set in each user's security profile:

• Entity permissions on Fiscal Period decide who can see, create, edit and delete periods.
• Server actions — Close Period, Reopen Period, Lock Period, Verify Ledger and Rebuild Balances — each need a grant on the profile's Actions tab. A user without the grant cannot run that action.

In the profiles that ship with xMatix, System Admin and Standard User include all five period actions, and Sales Executive includes Close Period. Review these grants and keep Close, Reopen and Lock for the people who own the close.

Configuration

• Put the period actions on the record page. The shipped fiscal period page header shows only Edit and Delete. Edit the Fiscal Period View layout and add Close Period, Reopen Period, Lock Period, Verify Ledger and Rebuild Balances to the page header's actions — see Design a form layout. Until you do, the actions exist and can be granted, but there is no button to run them.
• Fiscal years and periods — Finance → Settings → Fiscal Years. The year's dates decide the periods; see Fiscal years and periods.
• Year status — the Status field on the fiscal year. Anything other than Open stops postings into every period of the year.
• Security profiles — grant the period actions as described under Permissions.
• Organization shape — if We run multiple companies is off in Org Settings, the Partner Account field is hidden on periods.

Common problems

"Fiscal period '…' is Closed — posting is not allowed."

The document or journal date falls in a Closed (or Locked) period. If the date is wrong, change it to a date in an Open period. If it is right, get approval, select Reopen Period, post, and close the period again. A Locked period cannot be reopened.

"Financial year for period '…' is Closed — posting is not allowed."

The period is Open, but its fiscal year's Status is not Open. Check the year's status for a typo, or set it back to Open if the year should accept postings.

"Fiscal Period cannot be null!" when saving a journal

Despite its wording, this message appears when the journal's fiscal period is Closed. Treat it like the Closed-period message above: correct the journal date or reopen the period.

"Fiscal Period is required" on a journal

The journal has no Journal Date, so xMatix cannot work out its period. Enter the date and save again.

"Period is …; only … periods can transition to …"

The action does not fit the period's current status — for example Close Period on a period that is already Closed, or Reopen Period on a Locked one. Check the Status and pick the matching action.

"A locked fiscal period cannot be reopened."

Someone tried to change a Locked period's status. Locked is final; record any correction in an Open period instead.

"Closed or locked fiscal periods cannot be deleted."

Only Open periods can be deleted. If the period is Closed and really must go, reopen it first; a Locked period cannot be deleted.

"… is a derived ledger balance cache and cannot be modified directly."

You tried to create, edit, clone or delete a GL Period Balance or Party Period Balance row, from its screen or through an import. The same message, ending in created or deleted, covers the other cases. These rows only change through posting. To change a balance, post a journal. To correct a row that disagrees with the journals, run Verify Ledger and then Rebuild Balances on its period. The New, Edit, Clone and Delete buttons still appear on these records, but every save is refused.

A period balance's Opening Balance is 0 and its Closing Balance looks too small

That is expected. Each row holds only the movement posted within its own period, and Opening Balance is never filled in. For an account's balance at a date, use the financial statements or the account ledger, which add up all earlier periods for you.

A statement disagrees with the account's journals

The stored period totals may have drifted from the journals. Run Verify Ledger on the period the statement covers. If it reports GL mismatches, run Rebuild Balances and generate the statement again. Drift in an earlier month also shifts every later Balance Sheet and Trial Balance, so check earlier periods too.

I cannot find the Close Period button

The shipped period page shows only Edit and Delete. Ask your administrator to add the period actions to the Fiscal Period page layout and to grant them in your security profile.

Common questions

Does Close Period check that the month is reconciled?

No. Close Period only changes the status — it does not look for draft journals, failed postings, unreconciled bank statements or balance drift. Do that review first: work through Step 1, run Verify Ledger on the period, and use Rebuild Balances if it reports mismatched GL or party balances. Keep the reports you relied on so the close can be reviewed later. Once you are satisfied, close the period; if something turns up afterwards, an approved Reopen Period lets you correct it.

What are the Period Close and Period Close Check records?

They are meant to hold an audit trail of a close checklist. A Period Close record would hold one run, with its counts of checks, passed checks and mandatory failures. Each Period Close Check would hold one test with its code, whether it was mandatory, whether it passed and a detail of what failed. However, no app, button or job creates them. Close Period does not run a checklist, and both records are absent from every app and menu. A record you add by hand is not produced by any check. To review a month before closing, use the steps above. The Period Close Check reference explains each field.

What is the difference between Closed and Locked?

Both refuse postings. A Closed period can be reopened with Reopen Period for an approved correction, then closed again. A Locked period can never be reopened or deleted — xMatix refuses any change that moves it out of Locked, whether through an action or by editing the record. Close each month at month-end, and lock it only when its figures are final, for example after audit or a statutory filing.

Is there a soft close that lets some users still post?

No. Posting accepts only the Open status, for every user. To let a correction in, reopen the period, post it and close the period again.

Is it safe to run Rebuild Balances?

Yes. It only rewrites the period's stored GL and party balances from the posted journals — the journals themselves are untouched — and then re-runs Verify Ledger so you can see the result. It does not fix an unbalanced journal or a wrong open-item amount; those need the underlying document corrected.

Where can I see the stored period balances?

The GL Period Balance and Party Period Balance records are not in any app or menu. An administrator can open them by name from the App Launcher's entity list, or add them to an app (see Create an entity, step 7). The shipped list has no filters, and the record page doesn't show branch, business unit or cost centre. Rows for the same account and period can therefore look identical. For day-to-day work, the financial statements are the readable view of the same totals. Verify Ledger and Rebuild Balances on the fiscal period are the tools for checking and repairing them.

Does xMatix revalue foreign-currency balances at month-end?

Not from any screen. The platform has Currency Revaluation and Currency Revaluation Line records, a calculation that restates open bank, receivable and payable balances at the closing rate, and a posting that books the net unrealized gain or loss. However, no app, button or scheduled job runs that calculation or posting. A revaluation record created by hand calculates nothing and never reaches the ledger. To book an exchange difference before you close the month, post it as a manual journal to your foreign-exchange gain or loss account. The Currency Revaluation Line reference explains each field.

Where do I maintain exchange rates?

xMatix has an Exchange Rate record (From Currency, To Currency, Rate Type, Rate, Effective Date, Is Active, Partner Account). However, it is not in any app and has no form or list view out of the box. Its only reader is the revaluation calculation described above, which no screen runs, and invoices, bills, payments and journals do not read exchange rates. Rates you enter therefore change no posted figure today. If you keep them for reference, an administrator must first add the record to an app. When the revaluation calculation reads a rate, it takes the latest active Closing rate on or before the date. A blank company means the rate applies to every company. If only the reverse pair is on file, the calculation uses the reciprocal. The Exchange Rate reference explains each field.

Where do I set up currencies and the base currency, and what does it change?

In the Currency record. Like exchange rates, it is not in any app: an administrator opens it by name from the App Launcher, or adds it to an app first. Each row holds the ISO code in Name (for example INR), plus Symbol, Decimal Places (default 2), Is Active and Is Base Currency. Today the base currency only formats amounts on two Sense nudges. Overdue receivables shows its symbol and falls back to the rupee sign when none is set. Scheme threshold gap uses its symbol and decimal places. Invoices, bills, payments and journals do not look up this list, and nothing is converted or restated. Tick Is Base Currency on exactly one active row. The platform does not enforce this, and if several rows are ticked, the code that sorts first wins. The Currency reference explains each field.

Related topics

• Fiscal years and periods
• Working with journals
• AR and AP subledgers
• Financial statements
• Bank reconciliation
• Security profiles
• Fiscal Period — entity reference
• GL Period Balance — entity reference
• Party Period Balance — entity reference
• Period Close — entity reference