Month-End Close: Lock the books

Closing a month signs it off, but it doesn't freeze it. Late entries can still land in a closed month, and when a change is over your review threshold the month reads Closed – restated and asks you to re-sign it off. The only thing that freezes your books is the hard close date. Everything dated on or before it is locked, and the Year board shows it as a marker that reads Books locked through and the date.

Move the hard close date at quarter end or year end, once the months it covers are closed and signed off. Moving it needs a reason and the Accounting → Period Hard Close permission (accounting.period.hard_close), which only the Admin role has until you grant it to someone else. SKU.io reads your accounting provider's lock date but never writes it, so after each move you set the same date in Xero or QuickBooks yourself.

To…	Go to…
understand what the hard close date freezes, where it shows and how it differs from closing a month	How the hard close date works
lock the year at your financial year end, and see where Retained Earnings comes from	Year end and the close
set the hard close date for the first time, or move it forward through the months you've signed off	Move the hard close date
check that Xero or QuickBooks is locked to the same day as SKU.io, and fix it when it isn't	Keep your provider's lock aligned
open frozen months again to correct something, then lock them back	Lower or clear the hard close date

To lock a month in the same step as closing it, tick Also lock through this month in the close dialog. See Close a month.