Hi Hannah

Not doing the year end will prevent her getting PNL and Balance Sheet reports (she clearly doesnt need these!!!?!), but will in a couple of years make your job so much harder. Plus she is then not archiving her data so the system can become clogged and slow (depends on number of transactions and age of sage)

Encourage her to do backups as often as possible. You can do to a usb stick/dropbox - always more than one copy in case eg usb fails. Always check they work.

To back up - she needs to go to File--> Backup. It will ask if you wish to check data before you back up - always click yes --> Let that run - wont take long--> Check the errors/warnings/comments - need to resolve these (pop them on here if she gets any, or PM me if you want help with any of these). -->click close-->save backup (change file name to add some detail other than the date if you want eg pre year end routine run/post year end routine/post VAT etc. -->Test back up by doing a restore (BUT care she picks the right file!)

If she doesnt run a backup (which frankly knowing the messes Ive seen would be playing with fire!) - then at least do the data check routine regularly. I picked up a client who did neither - had fatal errors which prevented them using sage at all!!! Unless they paid a lot of money to sage for support, or knows a gal who between her mates can help drag it up to date!

So get her to do a backup FIRST (pre year end routine).

So year end routine.
After the backup.
I always run a few reports to make sure I have them as backup eg TB, PNL, Balance sheet, nominal activity (excluding no transactions) for just the year in question, debtors, creditors and Audit trail. (If she doesnt know how - post here)

Change the system date to the date of the year end ie 2015 year -->Settings (from top toolbar) --> Change program date  -->yes to the message -->change date--> ok.  This date will show on the bottom right of her sage screen now.

-->Tools (from the top bar)-->period end-->year end-->check the details (different for different versions of sage. might say - when do you want the journals running - use the LAST working day of the year. will confirm the start of the new year. archive option) -->run (or ok)

When you've run it - check the date on the bottom of the sage screen shows the first month of the next financial period.

Re-set your program date to today and run a backup.

Run nominal reports (excluding no transactions) using the b/f option (this is above all the other dates on this report criteria options box, or may be just a tick box option depending on the version of sage) - check THESE b/fwd balances to your records. If you asked for the year end journals to be keyed on the last working day they should match what you have. If they dont then it means she has keyed something with a wrong date perhaps and she will need to have a look for that.

Before you run the 2016 year end.
Check the figures are ok and in line with your 2015 year. Normally I would do this as soon as the adjusting journals are done. But as its too far past that time and she has no back up/would be too much re-keying if she did use a backup then you may just have to do some additional journals for sage to match your workings.

Get the same reports as listed above, showing b/fwds.  You can then do your 'stuff'  

if you are doing your journals on the last day I would say wait until she has keyed then before running the 2016 year end, if on the first day, run it now as above.

Further help

If you need anything else - please get the sage 50 type (eg standard/professional etc?)  and version info (-->Help option-->About-->version number), then feel free to post. Im in meeting with clients the rest of the week so will only be dipping in and out of here, so if its urgent PM me and I will see what I can do

Hope that helps

 

You are very welcome Hannah. Happy to hand hold if you need.

Onion4Sage wrote:

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Hi Hannah,

I'm over simplifying but, I think, the year end process is mainly to do with keeping the nominal period buckets right and transferring the P&L result for the year to the designated retained earnings account.

Instead of becoming involved in the client's year end / backup issues, perhaps you could have your client run some transational reports in the Finance section of Sage Report Designer for you? The transactional reports don't use the nominal period buckets and, consequently, are pretty much unaffected by Sage year end issues. Three reports will be useful: the Transactional Trial Balance; the Transactional Profit & Loss; and, the Transactional Balance Sheet. You'd want two copies of the Transactional Trial Balance - one for 1/1/1980 to your year end (to give your balance sheet nominal values (retained earnings will be the sum of all the P&L nominals plus the retained earnings account)) and the other for the date span of the current year (that will give you the nominal breakdown of the current year profit and the balance sheet account movements). Both the Transactional Profit & Loss and Transactional Balance Sheet should be run for the date span of the current year. If you want belt and braces, you could ask for all the reports for the previous year end too.

If you pass on Joanne's very helpful guidance re year end / backup, I'm sure your client will be very grateful. Meanwhile, with the transactional reports in hand, you'll be able to progress with your work without worrying about the resolution of your client's Sage issues.

Regards,

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 Ive used these before Ian, but not for a long time - forgotten in fact they were even there.   You just get used to doing things in a certain way sometimes and forget what else you can drag out of sage.  Well of course - you wont!  

Thank you Ian.....too kind!!

I wish I had more time to have a play with the reporting myself and a few other bits in sage. Am supposed to be learning about VT too. Not enough hours in the day!

Hi Hannah
You will be able to see if she has run the year end easily enough once you get the PC. The bottom of the screen when you are logged in will show a month a year date eg June 2015 - means this is the first day of the financial year sage is working on. The other date is a xx/xx/xx is the date you log on or a system date.

Re the report you have - I am assuming you have a nominal activity excluding no trans report? If so then the balance at the top will show today's balance (or up to where she has keyed to). The history balance is the balance as at the last date your ordered the report for. Good way to check this actually is by using that report and then ordering a transaction report that Ian talks about - order a transactional TB on the 5th April and they two should match.

(I would normally caveat that with as long as the b/fwd balance sheet figures are ok)

Thats correct

Can you tell me the version number? Go to top bar, far right, Help...About. Sage version .....

More later, on ipad now and not ideal for a few Qs as screen is small, besides I need to go and vote!

Oh bloomin heck - was hoping you were going to say v19 or something.

Can you order all the reports in excel??? This sage version was one of the first with csv available from what i can recall. So if youve managed to do the TB you are most of the way there. If not....

Its do-able but on the face of it, it looks like Sage cant provide the reports in excel format, but not once for just after midnight Im afraid as Im having my own other software issues. Namely numptying round VT.

Can you advise how you got the TB into excel, as that might save me some time?

I will do an update tomorrow, unless of course someone beats me to it.

If not - just so you have somewhere to start in the morning:-

Date at the bottom of the screen being June 15 = start date for the year you are looking to do the accounts for.

This means she hasnt run the year end for 31 May 2016 yet - she should not have done yet, until you extracted the reports you need for the actual full year.

For now - go to 'company' on the left hand side, then it will list all the nominals. Go to TB at the very top and click on it, for the date, go first to the very first option above all the dates and choose b/fwd - check this to last years position. Then go to the same report section and get a report for month 12.

To get a nominal report between dates - dont go via each nominal. Go to reports-nominal activity-nominal activity excluding no transactions and tick the b/fwd box and set your dates from 1 June 2015 to 31 May 2016. This will not be in excel but can give you a start to check.

You can click on the generate and 'email' option - even if no email has been set up in sage, the system will attempt to start an email - all you need to do is grab the enclosed file, copy and paste to your own email

Thanks I managed to load all the nominal ledger and extract it as csv so I have everything I need. I am still not sure about the dates and whether a blank reconciliation has ever been done but I have the info to prepare the accounts. I need to check the VAT return agrees to that submitted and the bank agrees to the bank statement so I can rely on the data.

I am going to recommend VTT+ going forward since I know it better and there aren't that many transactions.

So do not need the long email, thanks so much for your help. Let me know if I can help you on anything on VTT+ (although I tend to use the universal input sheet which I am told is not proper bookkeeping!).