Set Up Bookkeeping in Solabooks

Audience: owners, finance managers Difficulty: new user

What this covers

The first-day setup checklist for Solabooks. Do these in order. Each step builds on the one before. After the last step, you can create your first invoice.

Step 1 — Confirm organization details

1. Open Solabooks (Launch Solabooks from the parent app).
2. Click your organization name in the top bar > Organization Settings.
3. Confirm and edit:
   • Legal name — appears on documents.
   • Address — appears on PDF invoices.
   • Contact email and phone — appears in the document footer.
   • Tax registration / VAT number — if applicable.
4. Click Save.

Step 2 — Set your base currency

1. Go to Settings > Currencies.
2. Confirm the Base Currency matches the country you set during organization creation.
3. If you bill customers in other currencies, switch Multi-currency on (Settings > Features > Multi-currency) and add the additional currencies here.

The base currency cannot be changed once you have posted transactions. Get this right before posting.

Step 3 — Set the fiscal year

1. Go to Settings > Fiscal Years.
2. Click Add Fiscal Year.
3. Enter:
   • Start date — your fiscal year start (e.g. 2025-01-01).
   • End date — your fiscal year end (e.g. 2025-12-31).
   • Period length — usually Monthly.
4. Click Create. The system generates the periods inside.

You must have at least one fiscal year that covers the dates you plan to use, or postings will be rejected with "Fiscal year not configured".

Step 4 — Build the chart of accounts

1. Go to Accounting > Chart of Accounts.
2. The system seeds a starter list. Review each section:
   • Assets (Bank, Accounts Receivable, Inventory, …)
   • Liabilities (Accounts Payable, VAT Payable, …)
   • Equity (Owner's Equity, Retained Earnings, …)
   • Revenue (Sales Revenue, …)
   • Expenses (Cost of Goods Sold, Salaries, Utilities, …)
3. For each existing account, click the row and check the Subtype is correct (subtypes drive report grouping).
4. To add an account, click Add Account and fill in Code, Name, Type, Subtype.
5. To remove an unwanted starter account, click the row > Delete (if no transactions reference it; otherwise Archive).

For posting to work the system needs these defaults set:

• Accounts Receivable
• Accounts Payable
• Sales Revenue
• Cost of Goods Sold
• Inventory (only if you sell stock items)
• Output VAT (if VAT enabled)
• Input VAT (if VAT enabled)
• Default Bank
• Retained Earnings

Confirm under Settings > Accounting Defaults.

Step 5 — Set up taxes

If your country requires VAT or sales tax:

1. Make sure VAT is on at Settings > Features > VAT.
2. Go to Settings > Tax Rates.
3. The seed includes country defaults. For each tax you'll use:
   • Click the row > confirm rate, code, account.
   • Mark one as default for sales and one as default for purchases.
4. If you trade across borders, switch on Reverse Charge at Settings > Features > Reverse Charge and add the relevant codes.

If you do not need VAT, switch the feature off entirely and the tax UI disappears.

Step 6 — Open balances

If you are migrating from another system, open balances let you start with the right account values without re-entering history.

1. Go to Accounting > Chart of Accounts.
2. For each account that needs an opening balance, click the row > Add Opening Balance (requires accounts.add_opening_balance).
3. Enter:
   • As-of date — typically the day before your first posting.
   • Amount in the base currency.
4. Click Save. The system writes a special opening-balance journal that posts to Opening Balance Equity.
5. After all opening balances are entered, post a single closing journal (Accounting > Journal Entries > New) to clear Opening Balance Equity to Retained Earnings.

For customers and vendors with outstanding balances:

• Use AR > Customers > [Customer] > Opening Balance to enter the customer's prior outstanding invoice total.
• Use AP > Vendors > [Vendor] > Opening Balance for vendors.

Step 7 — Set up numbering sequences

1. Go to Settings > Numbering Sequences.
2. For each document type (Invoice, Quote, Bill, …) set:
   • Prefix (e.g. INV-).
   • Starting number (e.g. 1000).
   • Padding (number of digits).
3. Click Save.

Once a number has been used the prefix and padding can still be changed; the next-available number cannot be moved backwards.

Step 8 — Optional: PDF templates

If you have a designed letterhead:

1. Make sure PDF Templates is on at Settings > Features.
2. Go to Settings > PDF Templates.
3. Upload your logo, set colours, choose layout.
4. Click Set as default.

You are ready to bill

After Step 7 (and Step 8 if you customised the template) you can:

• Invite a team member
• Create your first invoice
• Record a payment

Related

• reference/accounting-rules
• reference/glossary
• reference/troubleshooting