Fiscal years, periods and lock dates

Every posting in SolaCount has to land in an accounting period, and every period belongs to a fiscal year. You can close and lock periods and years to freeze reported figures, and set an organization-wide lock date that blocks any posting dated on or before it. Year-end close writes a closing journal that moves the year's profit or loss to Retained Earnings.

Where to find it

The setup wizard creates your first fiscal year and its periods automatically. See Setup.

Statuses

Fiscal years and periods share three statuses. The Period Status Guide on the Periods page summarizes them:

The order is always Open → Closed → Locked. You can only lock a period or year after it is closed, and you can only reopen it while it is Closed.

Fiscal years

Create a fiscal year

1. Go to Settings → Accounting Periods → Fiscal Years and click New Fiscal Year (top right).
2. Fill in:

Quick Fill buttons fill a calendar year (Jan 1 – Dec 31) for you. 3. Click Create Fiscal Year. You see "Fiscal Year 'FY 2026' created successfully."

If the dates overlap an existing year, you see "The date range overlaps with an existing fiscal year."

Generate periods

On an open fiscal year's detail page that has no periods yet, click Generate 12 Monthly Periods. Periods are named by month ("January 2026"), and the first and last are trimmed to the fiscal-year dates. You can also click Add Period Manually.

• "Can only generate periods for an open fiscal year."
• "This fiscal year already has periods. Delete them first to regenerate."

Edit or delete a fiscal year

Click Edit on an Open fiscal year, then Save Changes. A locked year can't be edited ("Cannot edit a locked fiscal year."). Delete is refused if the year is locked or any of its periods has journal entries ("Cannot delete a fiscal year that has journal entries.").

Periods

Browse periods

Settings → Accounting Periods → Periods lists every period with counters for open, closed and locked periods. Filter by fiscal year (All Years) and status (All), then click Filter, or Reset to clear. Row actions depend on status: Edit Period and Close Period for open periods, Reopen Period and Lock Period (Final) for closed ones.

Create a period manually

Click Create Period, then choose the Fiscal Year, Period # (Month) (1–13, where 13 is the Adjustment Period (Year-End)), Period Name, and dates (Autofill dates helps). The dates must fall inside the fiscal year and can't overlap another period. You must create a fiscal year first ("You must create a Fiscal Year before adding accounting periods.").

Close a period

1. Click Close Period on the row or the period page.
2. Confirm "Close this period? No further entries allowed."
3. You see "Period 'March 2026' closed."

Reopen a period

Click Reopen Period on a closed period and confirm "Reopen this period for editing?". If its fiscal year was Closed, the fiscal year is reopened too. You can't reopen a locked period ("Cannot reopen a locked period. Locked periods are audit-final and permanent.") or a period whose fiscal year is locked ("Cannot reopen period: Fiscal year is locked.").

Lock a period (final)

Click Lock Period (Final) on a closed period and confirm "Lock this period permanently? This action is irreversible!". An open period can't be locked directly ("Period must be closed before it can be locked.").

Edit or delete a period

Only open periods are editable ("This period cannot be edited."). You can't change a period's dates once it contains journal entries, and you can't delete it ("Cannot delete a period that contains journal entries."). Close or lock it instead.

Year-end close

Closing a fiscal year posts the closing journal and marks the year Closed.

Before you start

• Every period in the year must be Closed or Locked ("Cannot close fiscal year: 3 period(s) are still open.").
• There must be no draft journals dated in the year ("Draft journals exist in this fiscal year. Post or delete them before closing.").
• A Retained Earnings account must exist (default code 3201). Check it under Settings → Accounting & Tax → Account Defaults.
• The year must have some revenue or expense activity ("No revenue or expense activity to close for this fiscal year.").

Close the year

1. Open the fiscal year and click Close Fiscal Year.
2. Confirm the dialog.
3. SolaCount posts a system journal (type year_end_close, memo "Year End Close FY 2026") dated on the last day of the fiscal year:
   • Each revenue and expense account (except accounts marked exclude from P&L) is zeroed. Revenue is debited and expenses are credited. Each line reads "Close 4100 - Sales Revenue".
   • The net result goes to Retained Earnings: "Transfer net profit to retained earnings" (credit) or "Transfer net loss to retained earnings" (debit).
   • Amounts use base-currency values.
4. You see "Fiscal Year 'FY 2026' closed."

This journal is the only posting allowed into a closed period.

Reopen a closed year

Click Reopen Fiscal Year and confirm "Reopen this fiscal year?". The year returns to Open. Its periods keep their status, so reopen the specific period you need as well.

Important: reopening does not reverse the closing journal, and posted journals are never rewritten. When you close the year again, SolaCount recalculates the revenue and expense balances (which already include the first closing journal, so they hold only the activity posted since) and posts the difference as a re-close adjustment: a new system journal dated on the last day of the year with memo "Year End Close (re-close adjustment) FY 2026", zeroing those accounts and moving the extra profit or loss to Retained Earnings. If nothing new was posted while the year was open, the re-close posts nothing and simply reuses the latest closing journal. Closing and re-closing journals are not counted as operating activity: they are left out of the cash flow and performance reports, while the equity statement shows earned results that have not yet been transferred by a close.

The closing journal's source is Fiscal Year; in the journal list it opens the year, and its lines are described with the account names in the page language. See Journal entries.

Lock a year (audit-final)

When the accounts are signed off, click Lock Fiscal Year (Final) and confirm "Lock this fiscal year permanently? This action is irreversible!". The year must be Closed, and all its periods Closed or Locked. Locking sets every period in the year to Locked. A locked year can never be reopened ("Cannot reopen a locked fiscal year. Locked fiscal years are audit-final and permanent.").

Organization lock date

The lock date is a single date per organization. Nothing can be posted on or before it, whatever the period status.

1. Go to Settings → Accounting & Tax → Precision & Lock Date.
2. In Period Lock Date ("No transactions can be posted on or before this date."), set Lock Date. Leave it empty to disable locking.
3. Click Save Settings. You see "Precision & lock settings saved." If approval is on for Precision, lock, and audit controls, the change is submitted for approval instead.

The same page holds Posted Document Rules: Allow editing posted documents, Allow deleting posted documents, and Require audit reason when editing posted documents (on by default).

Every change is audited. When you save this page, SolaCount writes a financial audit record named financial_controls_updated with the old and new values of the lock date, the money, quantity and exchange-rate decimal places, and the three posted-document switches (only the fields that actually changed). The save and its audit record are one transaction: if the audit record cannot be written, the setting is not changed. The records appear in Reports → Accountant → Audit Log, so you can answer "who moved the lock date, and when" after the fact.

What is blocked, and the exact messages

Every posting path (invoices, bills, payments, expenses, journals, recurring runs, reversals, and so on) checks the date in this order:

On a posted document, Unpost and Reverse are disabled when its period is closed or locked. The document shows the reason, for example "Accounting period 'March 2026' is closed". Drafts can still be created and edited, but they can't be posted until the date is in an open period after the lock date.

A reversal is posted on the reversal date, so pick a date in an open period after the lock date.

Permissions

Buttons you don't have permission for are hidden. Close, reopen and lock (for both periods and years), and lock-date changes, can also require approval. See Workflow & Approvals.

Worked example

Al Noor Trading LLC runs a calendar fiscal year, FY 2026. Its 2026 totals are: Sales Revenue AED 1,200,000, Service Revenue AED 150,000, Cost of Goods Sold AED 700,000, Rent AED 180,000, Salaries AED 290,000. Net profit = 1,350,000 − 1,170,000 = AED 180,000.

1. After the March VAT return is finalized, the owner sets Lock Date to 31/03/2026. Nobody can post into Q1 any more.
2. In January 2027, the manager closes January–December 2026 on the Periods page, posts the remaining draft journals, and clicks Close Fiscal Year.
3. SolaCount posts the closing journal dated 31/12/2026:

4. After the audit, the owner clicks Lock Fiscal Year (Final).

Tips

• A good routine: post the month, run base-currency adjustments, finalize the VAT return, close the period, and move the lock date forward.
• Use Close for month-end. Keep Lock for figures that are audited or filed, because it can't be undone.
• Make sure next year's fiscal year and periods exist before the year ends, or January postings fail with "No accounting period exists for date…".
• A recurring template run that falls in a closed period follows that template's period-closed setting.

Related

• Workflow & Approvals
• Accounting rules
• Journals, Invoices, Bills, Payments
• Taxes & VAT, Recurring transactions, Reports
• Setup, Settings