The 5-point monthly close checklist we run for 20 clients

A monthly close is not "bank feeds look green in QuickBooks." It is a repeatable five-point sequence, and every one of our 20 client accounts runs it before the 5th business day. Here is the checklist, in order, with the two review gates most small businesses skip.

1. Reconcile every account — including the boring ones

Bank and credit card first, then the accounts people forget: PayPal, Stripe payouts (fees and refunds land separately from gross sales), the Square clearing account, and any owner-funds-in-transit account. An unreconciled clearing account is where small discrepancies become year-end archaeology.

Gate: the reconciliation report must show a $0.00 difference. Not "close enough" — zero.

2. Tie out AR and AP

• Every invoice older than 60 days gets a status note (disputed, forgotten, or uncollectible).
• Every vendor bill is matched to what was actually delivered — duplicate vendor charges are the single most common cash leak we find. first-month bill reviews routinely surface software nobody has opened in a year.

3. Payroll cross-check

Gross wages per the payroll report must equal the payroll expense in the books, and every payroll tax liability account should roll to zero after each filing. A lingering balance usually means a journal entry was booked but the payment never was — or the reverse.

4. Review the review gates

This is the part almost everyone skips:

• Gate A (bookkeeper): every balance-sheet account with a balance has a statement or schedule behind it. No unexplained amounts.
• Gate B (second set of eyes): a CPA-level reviewer samples five transactions and re-performs the categorization. On our team, Gate B rejects about 4% of first-pass closes. That rejection rate is the system working.

5. Publish three numbers to the owner

Revenue, gross margin, and cash on hand with a 13-week look-ahead. Not a 40-tab report — three numbers the owner will actually read.

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Run this sequence every month and your books stop being a source of anxiety and start being a decision tool. If you want the full 45-point version of this checklist (the one with the tie-out schedules), it is one of our free resources.

And if you would rather never run the checklist yourself — that is literally our job. See what our bookkeeping service includes, month after month.

Questions about a specific step? Bring them to a free 30-minute consultation — we will look at your actual books together.