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Which months you can close, and in what order

The Year board on Accounting → Close shows one tile per month, and at most one month at a time is the one up for closing. This page explains which months appear, why they close oldest-first, how months on or before an old lock date are handled, and why a month that changed after sign-off doesn't hold up the next close.

Which months appear​

The Year board shows the twelve months of one year. Use the arrows beside the year to move between years. The board opens on the year of the month you have open, or otherwise the year of the next month to close.

Your accounting history runs from the first month of your books through the current month. SKU.io works out where it begins in one of two ways:

  • If you have set an Accounting Start Date (Accounting → Settings → General), it begins with the month that date falls in.
  • If no start date is set, it begins with the month of your earliest accounting entry.

A month outside that range shows as a greyed Not started tile that you can't open. That covers months still to come and months before your books begin. The arrows stop at the edges of your history too: hover a greyed arrow and it reads, for example, No accounting history before 2025. or 2027 hasn't started.

A link that names a month outside your history doesn't open it. The drawer explains why: January 2024 is before the accounting start date, so it is frozen history. or December 2026 is in the future.

On a phone, a Period picker and a list of months, newest first, replace the board.

Months close oldest-first​

Only the earliest month that isn't closed yet can be closed. On the Year board, that month's tile reads Up next while it's still Open, and shows its progress, for example 25/33 done, once you start it. Its drawer says This is the next month to close.

On the next month to close, the main button in the drawer's header is live: Start close while the month is Open, and Close period once it's In Review. On any later month the button is greyed out, and hovering it names the month that's actually next:

Close June 2026 first — periods close oldest-first.

The later month's drawer says the same thing under its … is open heading. It isn't only a screen restriction: if a later month's close is requested anyway, it's refused with Months close in order. Close June 2026 first.

A quiet month still has to be closed. You can't skip a month because little happened in it. Start the close, let the checks run, and close it. A month with no activity usually walks straight through the checklist. See close a month.

Months locked before they were closed​

Your books may have been locked through a date before you started closing months in SKU.io: a year tied out and locked by hand, for example. A month on or before that date that nobody ever closed reads Locked, not closed. It's frozen all the same, but there's no checklist and no saved report pack behind it.

These months run on a separate track, so they never hold up the months after the lock:

  • The earliest Locked, not closed month shows Optional close on its tile.
  • Its drawer explains: "The lock date covers this month, but nobody ran a checklist or signed it off, so there's no saved report pack. It's frozen all the same, and it can still be closed for the record."
  • Its button reads Close for the record instead of Start close.

Closing for the record is up to you. Within that track months still close oldest-first, but nothing after the lock waits for them.

A restated earlier month doesn't hold you up​

A closed month isn't frozen. When a late entry lands in March after you signed March off, March reads Closed – restated and asks for a re-sign-off. Later months whose opening balances moved as a knock-on get a Balance moved tag, and need nothing from you.

None of that stops you closing the next month. While March waits for its re-sign-off, April's checklist shows the Earlier months re-signed warning, for example March 2026 changed after sign-off and needs a re-sign-off, with an arrow to March. Acknowledge it in the close dialog and April closes. April's opening balances already include March's change.

The one thing a restated month does block is hardening: you can't move your hard close date past a month that's waiting for a re-sign-off. See re-sign-off a restated month and move the hard close date.

To correct a closed month, you don't reopen it. Post the correction on its true date. The month becomes Closed – restated, and you re-sign it off once. See when a closed month changes.

Only the most recently closed month can be reopened​

Reopen… is only for pulling back a sign-off made by mistake. It sits in the closed month's drawer. On every closed month except the latest, it's greyed out and its tooltip reads:

Only the latest closed period can be reopened — reopen later months first.

This is the oldest-first rule seen from the other end. If you reopened March while April and May stayed closed, the closed months would no longer run in order.

On a month on or before your hard close date, Reopen… is greyed out with Lower the hard close date first. A hard-locked month is frozen; to correct one, see lower or clear the hard close date.

Reopening asks for a reason, keeps the signed-off report pack in History flagged as stale, and returns the month to In Review. Closing it again makes a new sign-off revision. See reopen a closed month.

Only one close can run at a time​

A close runs in the background and shows its progress in the job tray, so the Close page stays usable while it works. Only one close can run at a time across your whole business:

  • A second close request while one is running is refused with Another period close is already running — wait for it to finish.
  • While a close is running, Close period reads The close job is already running — track it in the job tray., and a reopen is refused with A period close is running — wait for it to finish before reopening. An earlier month can't be pulled back underneath a close that's already in flight.
  • If two people click Close period at the same moment, one close starts and the other is refused. You never get two closes of the same month, or two closes at once.

Close and reopen actions take their turn one at a time behind the scenes. If one can't take its turn within about 15 seconds, it gives up rather than waiting. That refusal arrives as a plain red error with no reason attached. When a close or reopen fails at month end with nothing useful on screen and several people are working at once, wait a moment and try again. Nothing is half-done when it happens.

When there are no months to close yet​

A brand-new set of books has nothing to close, and the Close page says so:

No accounting history yet Months appear here once your accounting start date is set and entries begin generating — then you can run a formal month-end close.

You see this when:

  • No Accounting Start Date is set and no accounting entries exist yet.
  • The Accounting Start Date is in the future. Accounting hasn't begun, so there's no month to close yet, not even the current one.
  • Accounting entries exist but no start date is set, and no entry has been generated yet. The empty state disappears as soon as the first entry is generated.

If you expect months and see the empty state, check your Accounting Start Date first (Accounting → Settings → General), then confirm entries are being generated. See how automatic accounting works.

The first month you close asks for your opening balance​

An opening balance is the set of account starting positions you carry in from before you kept books in SKU.io. Without it, the first month's Balance Sheet is missing its starting figures.

The Opening balance applied check, in the Data completeness group, is where that lands:

  • It's a Blocking check on the very first month you close. If your opening balance is still a draft, that first close can't go ahead until you apply it in Accounting → Reconciliation → Starting Balances. No permission or acknowledgement gets you past it; see what stops a close.
  • Every later month shows the check as not applicable, in grey under its title: Not applicable — an opening balance only applies to the first period you close, not this month.
  • If you never set one up, every month reads Not applicable — no opening balance was set up for this books-start, so there is nothing to apply.

The first month you close is the month containing your Accounting Start Date, not necessarily the month you first entered data. If your start date is March 1 but you began entering orders in May, March is the first month you close, and March's close asks about the opening balance.

Next steps​

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