To begin with the group financial statement, you must first import the accounting data into the group company.
Import group company data into the group
Once the legal accounting data is uploaded and the correct currency is set, it's time to import the accounting data into the group. This is done under "Finance" → "Group consolidation" → "Group data" → "Accounting data". Then click on "Import corporate accounting".
In the image, you can see that some periods are highlighted in different colours, which indicates the following:
Grey highlight = Period not relevant for the group.
Blue highlight = There is accounting data in the legal company that can be imported into the group.
Green highlight = Accounting data in the legal company matches the accounting data in the group.
Yellow highlight = Accounting data in the legal company differs from the accounting data in the group.
Red highlight = Accounting data is not imported into the legal company.
During the import to the group, verify that the correct fiscal year and period are being imported. It is also possible to import data from subgroups, as shown in the image below.
Reconciliation balance
Under the "Reconciliation balance" tab, a check is performed on the opening balance (IB) and closing balance (UB) for each legal entity at the group level and between fiscal years and periods. Reconciliation of the opening balance compared to the previous year (fiscal year). A warning will appear if there is a difference between fiscal years. Several reasons can contribute to this difference, and below we have listed the most common ones:
- Reclassifications between accounts make a difference as the values differ at the account level. Review and ensure that the sum on the asset and liability sides agree.
- Differences in the accounting of the legal entity. Review the "Legal Accounting" - "Reconciliation balance" tab and investigate. For example, there may be a discrepancy when booking the current year's results in the legal accounting but not importing it into the tool.
- Differences can also arise if the elimination of the current year's results in the group is missed.
- Differences between the imported accounting data in the legal entity and the imported accounting data in the group. Ensure that the accounting data is imported into the group correctly.
- Differences between fiscal year can occur if changes have been made in regular accounting in connection with the financial statements, such as accounting adjustments.
- Differences can occur if each legal entity's group chart of accounts differs. It may also be due to account bridging in a legal entity. Go back to the "Accounting plan" and review how the group chart of accounts and account bridging are set up.
Reconciliations of Opening Balance Elimination Categories compared to the previous year (fiscal year).
Eliminations made in the previous fiscal year should be synchronized so that they do not need to be repeated for the upcoming year. There is no risk of duplicating elimination entries.
Reconciliation of Imported Opening/Closing Balance to the Consolidated Data compared to Legal Accounting (period).
This reconciliation shows if there is any difference between legal accounting and consolidated data between two periods in the fiscal year.
It only works for foreign subsidiaries as they are displayed in the local currency at the legal accounting level and consolidated currency.
Accounting Adjustments
Accounting adjustments are adjustments made between the individual company's legal accounting and the consolidated data's accounting. Here, an adjustment can be made to the accounting in the legal entity without affecting the regular bookkeeping program. The "Reset" button provides a proposed adjustment that can be modified and saved.
Examples of adjustments that can be made in this view are:
- If the accounting in a company has been entered incorrectly but is locked by an accounting firm, the adjustment can be made in the tool instead.
- Reallocation of the period's result without affecting the regular bookkeeping program.
- Reallocation of accrued profit from BR to RR when acquiring a company in the middle of a period.
- In the case of the disposal or merger of a company in a group, a final date is determined in the "Ownership Distribution" tab, which leads to an automatic booking of balances in bookkeeping adjustments. The system resets all balances in the disposed company by contra-booking all balance values. The accrued profit in RR and any eliminations made in the disposed-of company must be handled manually. The accrued profit in RR is added to equity and booked back against RR account 8999 on the disposal date. Eliminations made are reversed on the day following the disposal date to ensure they are not retained.
- Handling of heterogeneous groups where a company in the group has a different fiscal year compared to the group. Accrued profit is booked for the company with a different fiscal year, where it is booked to equity to reflect an accurate picture of the group's balances.
Minority
The minority can be activated via Consolidated Data → Minority Settings. When a minority is activated, calculations for the subsidiary (over 50-99.9% or companies defined as Subsidiaries through ownership distribution) will be used automatically. Further information on minorities can be found in a separate section.
Counterparties accounting file
Under this tab, you can "tag" transactions and vouchers in your accounting system using dimension and object (Your local accounting program may have other terms for dimension and object, such as cost centre or project). If you have created a dimension named "Group" in your accounting program, the respective objects in the dimension can be labelled with the names of the companies. In Boardeaser, you select the type of dimension (cost centre or project) and the object number for each company in the group where counterpart tagging has been registered. See the image below.
Counterparty tagging via transaction text
With counterpart tagging via transaction text, you can "tag" counterparties from the transactions in the accounting system using different search terms. In addition to a standard search with the companies' names, adding additional search terms is possible. To add a search term, click on the respective company and then on the three dots on the right. The function filters out all transactions containing the name of the search term and displays them in a list. See the image below. It is important to note that it searches for the exact name in the search term. In this view, it is also possible to "block search terms". This tagging will not be included as an internal counterparty, indicated by the purple highlight below. Counterparty tagging via transaction text must be saved with each new financial statement, regardless of whether anything new has been added.
Handling of internal transactions through integration with the accounting system
An SIE file only sometimes contains information about which customer or supplier an invoice pertains to. Through direct integration with the accounting system, Fortnox supports detecting internal transactions with invoice management. This means that Fortnox lists all invoices in Fortnox and tags the company names, total amount, and invoice notifications.
Integrated invoices can be viewed under “Data Management” → “Accounting” → “Invoices”. See the image below.
Transaction Analysis
Under this tab, all internal transactions that should not be handled in the regular elimination phase are managed. Examples of such transactions include zero transactions, rounding differences, and credits. These transactions are cleared away so as not to affect or "disrupt" other internal transactions. In other words, a cleared rounding difference in this view will not affect the matching it is related to. To clear the transactions, click on "Mark transactions as revolved". See the image below. These transactions will then appear under the "Internal transactions" tab. To view them under “Internal transactions" click "Customize" and then check the boxes for credits, zero transactions, and rounding differences.
Counterparty Reconciliation
Under the counterparty reconciliation tab, you get an overview of all tagged internal transactions between the group companies. This reconciliation is performed before eliminations are carried out, directly on the consolidated company's accounting data. Ensuring that all counterparties match makes it easy to eliminate all internal transactions.
The overview is divided into six categories based on the Basic Chart of Accounts (Bas-kontoplan), but you can also add your categories. This is done under the "Automatic eliminations" tab.
The matrix has four colour codes indicating whether an internal transaction between two companies matches or does not match (see image below). If they do not match in this view, you can correct them before running your automatic eliminations.
A difference between the companies can have various causes, such as:
- The transaction is recorded in different periods.
- The transaction is recorded on a different account than what the elimination rule is set to.
- Currency differences.
- The transaction is not recorded in one of the companies.
You can also perform eliminations in this view by clicking on the "eliminate" button. See the image below.