← All updates
/#0008

Month-end close, guided client by client

A close should feel like one guided path, not a pile of spreadsheets. Each client now closes on their own cadence (weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly), driven by a real ten-stage state machine, with the AI bookkeeper built right into the flow. The piece firms care about most is the open-items loop: staff send open items to the client, the client clears them in their own portal, and the close loops back until they are. Everything stays gated by your sign-off, and any step that depends on an outside connection says so plainly instead of faking a result.

A guided rail on each client's cadence

One state machine drives the close, so every client moves through the same well-defined stages.

  • Each client closes on their own cadence (weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly), and the real ten-stage state machine drives the rail from trigger to seal.
  • The AI bookkeeper (the Categorization Workbench) lives in the nav under Accounting and inline in the close, so the bank-to-books work happens right where the close needs it.
  • Partner-driven stages carry the close through variance review and the client close call before anything seals.

The open-items loop, end to end

Open items go to the client and come back cleared, with the close holding until they do.

  • Staff send open items to the client; the client sees and clears them in their own portal.
  • The close loops back until every item is cleared, and the workpapers don't refresh until then, so nothing finalizes on stale answers.
  • The QuickBooks-to-Bill.com AP tie-out pulls real bill and payment events where both connections are in place, and reports needs key or no AP data otherwise, never a false tie-out.

Seal and lock, with a trail

Finalizing a period is a deliberate, recorded act you can stand behind.

  • Finalize seals the period and hard-locks it, so a closed month stays closed.
  • An append-only audit trail records how the period got there, stage by stage.

Fixes & improvements

  • The client side of the open-items loop is now live in the portal, so clearing happens where the client already works.
  • The QuickBooks-to-Bill.com AP tie-out reports an honest needs-key or no-AP-data state instead of ever showing a tie-out that didn't run.
  • The Categorization Workbench is findable in the nav and surfaced inline in the close.