1. Closing the Month in SAGE 300 CRE
Glenn Klein, MBA
Senior SAGE Consultant, Aronson LLC
April 4th, 2019
*Information contained in this presentation may have been obtained by the use of the SAGE Knowledgebase and printed training materials provided by SAGE.

2. Why is it Important to Close the Month in SAGE 300 CRE?
It allows you to segregate months of financial data in the appropriate periods.
Closing the month allows the totals to move from current month to previous month.
Reports will be run on the current file and will display only current period data.

3. Main Points for Discussion
Backing up your data in the accounting system
Making sure that all financial transactions have been posted
Closing the month for each of the modules except the General Ledger
Closing the month in the General Ledger
Printing all of the Month-End reports

4. Backup your data - Using File Tools
Before starting the backup you have to ensure that everyone has exited all SAGE 300 CRE applications.
In any accounting application, from the Tools menu, select File Tools. In any estimating application, from the File menu, select File Tools.
Select Backup and click Next.

5. Backup your data using File Tools (continued)
Additional data folders or files can be added to the backup that File Tools creates.
Click Next
In the Destination box, type the path to the location where you want to save the .tszip archive file that the backup process creates. Click Browse to browse to the location where you want to save the .tszip file.

6. Backup your data (continued)
In the Archive Name box, type the name that you want for your .tszip file
Type
Click Next to begin the validation process. (There are a few steps in the validation process but that depends on the options requested)
Click
Click Next
Review the list of all the files that you are about to backup. The State column indicates whether you decided to include or skip a file.
Review
Click Next after selecting thee files included or skipped
Verify the information in the Execution Summary window is correct.
Verify

7. Backup your data (continued)
Click Next to backup your files
Review the information in the Operations Journal window
Optional: If you want to print your journal to a file or printer, select Summary or Detail from the list depending on the level of detail that you want to see. Click Save to save your journal to a text file. Click Print to print your journal to a printer.
Click Finish

8. Check to make sure that all of the company’s financial transactions have posted

9. Close the month in all the modules except the General Ledger
Accounts Payable
Payroll
Billing
Accounts Receivable
Cash Management
Job Cost

10. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Accounts Payable
Post invoices
Post checks
Record manual checks
Check for any unposted items
Print month-end reports

11. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Payroll
Post checks
Print Month-End reports
Reconcile with the General Ledger
Make any necessary corrections
Check the new .prt for any unposted items and correct

12. Suggested payroll reports that may be run at month-end
Monthly Employment Utilization
Earnings Register
Deposit Summary
Employee Deduction, Fringe and Earnings Totals
Tax Register

13. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Billing
Create Invoices
Post Invoices
Check the inquiry, transactions for current cost based job transactions
Make any necessary corrections and post
Or remove any unwanted entries from the new .blt file

14. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Accounts Receivable
Post Invoices
Verify everything is posted by running an inquiry, entries, transactions and select the new and active files. If unposted items exist, make corrections and post
Print Month-End reports
Reconcile with the General Ledger
Make any necessary corrections

15. Suggested Accounts Receivable reports that may be run at Month-End
Aging Detail by Customer or Contract
Deposit with Items
Sales Tax
Statements
Batch Reconciliation to/from the General Ledger

16. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Job Cost
Post Invoices
Verify everything is posted by running an Inquiry, Entries, All entries or Entries by Batch and selecting the new file. Make corrections and post
Print Month-End reports
Reconcile with the General Ledger
Make any necessary corrections

17. Month-End tasks that should be completed in Cash Management
Post Entries
Reconcile to your bank statement
Reconcile with the General Ledger
Make any necessary corrections
Print out all backup reports

18. Closing the month in Contracts - What Happens?
Advances the Current Month in the Contract Settings
When you close the month in the Contracts application, the Next Month totals on the Billed Totals, Adjustment Totals, Retainage Totals & Miscellaneous tabs of the contract and contract item are cleared and those amounts move to the Month-to-Date totals
If the new month is the first month of a new year, the Next Year totals clear and move to the Year-to-Date totals
Moves the totals in the next month total fields to the month to date fields on the contract and contract item records
If the new month is the first month of the new year, it moves the totals in the Next Year total fields to the year to date total fields on the contract and contract item records

19. Closing the month in Contracts
To close the month in Contracts, all users must be logged out of Contracts, Billing and Project Management
In Contracts, from the Tasks menu, select Close Month. Review the current month to verify you want to close the month and then click Start
Notes: Contracts allows you to post up to one month into the future of the current month. Post entries in Contracts after you close the month to update your contracts with any unposted transactions
To review transactions before posting, from the Inquiry menu, select Other, select Unposted Transactions, select Active, click OK, select Active again and then click OK

20. Steps to Closing the month in Job Cost
Have everyone log out of the software
Do a full backup of the company data
Go to Tasks>Close Month
A journal is produced which lists all jobs and shows whether each job is in balance
Review the JC Close Month to verify that the totals on the jobs are in balance
Note—The JC Close Month processing is not reversible. Be sure to process all monthly reports and backup the Job Cost Master file before selecting this command. The JC Close Month journal can’t be reproduced. It is a report generated internally only when the Close Month task is run

21. Closing the month in Payroll
Make sure you have run all the reports that are needed and that all users are out of the system
In the application go to Task, Close Month
Select your new month for Payroll
Click Start when you are ready to close the month

22. Close the month in the General Ledger
Advances the current account activity balances
Advances the current period activity date
Opens a new accounting period

23. Close the month in the General Ledger
Verify that all other applications have completed processing for the period
Post any entries that affect the current period
Reconcile General Ledger

24. Print all of the Month-End reports
Trial Balance
Current Ledger
Year to Date Ledger
Financial Statements
Balancing Reports

25. Print all of the Month-End reports (continued)
Trial Balance

26. Print all of the Month-End reports (continued)
Current Ledger

27. Print all of the Month-End reports (continued)
Year-to-Date Ledger

28. Print all the Month-End reports – Financial Statements

29. Print all the Month-End reports-continued
Balancing Reports

30. Monthly Tasks Workflow Center
Launch Sage Desktop
Go to Applications, Additional Tools
Launch the Monthly Tasks Workflow Center

31. Monthly Tasks Workflow Center (continued)

32. Monthly Tasks Workflow Center (continued)

33. Close Month Problems or Issues
I closed the month in the General Ledger by mistake
I closed the month in Payroll before I was ready
What if I forgot to close the month in Payroll?

34. I closed the month in the General Ledger by mistake.
You can’t undo the Close Current Period task, however the General Ledger does allow you to post to and report on prior periods
If you really want to undo the Close Current Period task then you will have to restore your entire data folder from the backup that you made prior to the running the Close Current Period task
You can re-open a closed period for posting in the General Ledger by running the task Open/Close Posting Periods

35. I closed the month in Payroll before I was ready.
Payroll posts to its own application based on the check date and to other applications based on the accounting date. The entries should go to the proper location based on the dates
You can still run your payroll process to the prior period that you did not want to close as long as the prior period is open in the General Ledger
Reports that run off the Employee master files wouldn’t have the correct Month-to-Date totals. You can run these reports off of date range on the check record
Items such as Pays, Deductions, Fringes and Taxes that are calculated based on a Month-to-Date total or limit may not calculate correctly.

36. What if I forgot to close the month in Payroll?
If you do not close the month and then you process or print your checks as you normally do, then the information that is processed (generated) may not be accurate
Various calculations such as deductions, fringes or taxes may not calculate correctly
You may fix this if you only processed your payroll by then closing the month and then reprocessing. If you printed the checks and now need to make corrections then you will have to void the checks to make your corrections

37. Senior SAGE Consultant
Questions?
Contact Info:
Glenn Klein, MBA
Senior SAGE Consultant
Aronson LLC