Close Sales Month Procedures

At the end of a calendar month, you will need to close the sales month.

Close a sales month when you are ready to stop posting sales to that month and are ready to post to the next.

The ideal time, of course, is after sales for the last calendar day of a month are transferred from POS and are posted in ICS. Remember, however, as a precaution, that a sales month cannot be closed prior to 5 days before the actual end of the calendar month. A warning will be given if you attempt to close the month too early.

If you do not close a sales month by the first day of the next calendar month, the message Current Sales Month is not the current month will appear whenever you open a module. This is a reminder to close the sales month so that sales can begin posting to the next month.

Close Sales Month Checklist for PrismCore ICS

The letters and numbers on this checklist correspond to the letters and numbers on the Close Sales Month Checklist Details for PrismCore ICS section. For in depth explanations, please refer to that section.
NOTE: The order in which these are listed is the best-case scenario. Call PrismCore ICS Support if you have any questions.

1. Make sure all information is current in PrismCore ICS.
   1. Receive all items ready to be received (including merchandise transfers).
   2. Enter and post all available invoices.
   3. Enter all miscellaneous stock adjustments.
   4. Post buyback, if necessary, and close all buyback invoices, if necessary. If this is not done, and you are set to require closing of buyback invoices, the Close the Sales Month process is halted and you will have to back out, and close the invoices before you can continue.
   5. Post all returns, merchandise transfers or sale to wholesalers that are ready to go out.
   6. Enter and post all available finished credit memos at Resolve credit requests (including merchandise transfers, discrepancies, and sale to wholesales).
   7. Ship all Mail Orders that are ready to go out.
   8. It is important that, in Item Maintenance, items have a cost and retail price.
   9. It is important to review negative inventory before closing the sales month.
2. Sales
   1. Verify that all sales that were incurred for the previous days of the month are posted on PrismCore ICS.
   2. Post the sales for the last day of the month. If closing at end of business day.
   3. Run the Daily Update from PrismCore Admin.
3. Review Stock Ledger Reports
   1. Run the Stock Ledger Spreadsheet report
   2. Run each of the individual Stock Ledger reports.
   3. Compare the Stock Ledger reports with the Stock Ledger spreadsheet
4. Close the Sales Month
   1. Close the sales month.
   2. Be sure you have a good backup from the night before.
   3. Do not check the box to "Post any remaining Unposted Sales" if you have already posted them manually.
      1. Check this box only if you skipped step B3 above.
      2. If you have unposted sales, and want to close the month without posting them, do not check the box, and click OK.
      3. If unposted sales exist, a dialogue will appear, stating, "Unposted sales exist. Do you want to post these sales before closing the month?". If you do NOT want to post, say No. If you do wish to post, say yes.
         
         NOTE: This is the last chance you have to cancel the close sales month process.
         
         
   4. Standard Retail Inventory Valuation Method Only: run the Cost of Goods Sold process after verifying that the Daily Update has been run. Be sure to run the Daily Update to the spreadsheet after running COGS.
   5. Run the 'Calculate Inventory Variance' process. If you use the Standard Retail Inventory Method, you can run this process immediately after running the COGS process.
   6. Run the Inventory Value report from Physical Inventory module imediately after closing sales month.  Compare values to current/ending values in stock ledger.
   7. Review the Stock Ledger Spreadsheet report. Call PrismCore ICS Support, as soon as you can, if there are any discrepancies or if you have any questions

Close Sales Month Checklist Details for PrismCore ICS

The letters and numbers below correspond with the letters and numbers on the End of Month Checklist for PrismCore ICS (if closing sales month on last day of the month).
NOTE: The order in which these steps are listed is the best-case scenario. Please call PrismCore ICS Support if you have any questions.

1. Make sure you are as current as you can be in processing all information in PrismCore ICS. This is very important. To get an accurate current inventory value in your Stock Ledger, stock on hand and the accounting costs of items must be as current as possible.
   1. Receive all items (including merchandise transfers). This affects your stock on hand and the dollar value of Purchase Accruals in the Stock Ledger.
   2. Enter and post all available invoices. If your Inventory Valuation Method is either FIFO or Moving Average, only closed invoices are used in the calculation of an item's accounting cost. Invoices affect the dollar value of Purchases and conversely Purchase Accruals in your Stock Ledger and under the Purchase/Sales information on the <F9>Quick Menu.
   3. Enter all miscellaneous stock adjustments. This affects your stock on hand and the dollar amount in the Stock Adjustments in the Stock Ledger.
   4. Post buyback, if necessary, and then close any open Buyback Invoices. These affect your Purchases and conversely the Purchase Accruals on the Stock Ledger and the current accounting cost (if FIFO or Moving Average).
   5. Post all returns, merchandise transfers, or sale to wholesalers that are ready to be posted. These affect your stock on hand and the dollar value in Return Accruals/Return Accruals Gain-Loss in the Stock Ledger.
   6. Enter and post all credit memos available to be posted at Resolve credit requests (including merchandise transfers, discrepancies, sale to wholesalers). These affect your Returns/Returns Gain-Loss and conversely affect your Returns Accruals in the stock ledger.
   7. Ship all Mail Orders that are ready to go out. This affects the dollar amount of Sales in the Stock Ledger.
   8. It is important that, in Item Maintenance, items have a cost and retail price. If you use FIFO or Moving Average Inventory Valuation Methods to calculate Cost of Goods Sold and there are not any closed invoices, the accounting cost will be calculated with the cost of the item at Item Maintenance. If there is no cost, then it will use the desired margin for that DCC multiplied by the POS retail price. If you use the Standard Retail Method of Inventory Valuation, the accounting cost will be calculated using either actual margin or desired margin multiplied by POS retail.
   9. It is important to review negative inventory prior to closing the sales month. When shrinkage is calculated, it will assume all negative inventory quantities are zero and make adjustments accordingly.
   10. Print and review Stock Ledger reports. If something looks amiss, check it out and correct it before the sales month is closed.
2. Sales
   1. Verify that ALL sales incurred for the previous days of the month are posted in PrismCore ICS. On a daily basis, compare the POS Register Reports to the PrismCore ICS Posted or Unposted Sales Reports, to make sure they match.
   2. Close the store and shut down the registers. Proceed with the POS end of day procedures. Before starting the process of closing the sales month on ICS, be sure enough time has expired for POS to talk to ICS and merge sales into the "Manual Sales" module of PrismCore. Balance this number with the POS register report and the reports from ICS. Post Sales. You also have the option of posting sales as part of the Close the sales month process. If you would rather do this, skip this step.
   3. Since running the daily update is what updates your store's spreadsheet numbers, it is important to run this update right before closing the sales month. This process is run from PrismCore Admin, within the "Update Stock Ledger" module.
3. Review Stock Ledger Reports
   1. Run the Stock Ledger Spreadsheet report. This report shows you the overall activity in your store in any given month. You should be sure that all fields look appropriate, based on your store activity.
   2. Run the individual Stock Ledger reports. These reports show a detailed listing of each field in the spreadsheet. You should look over these reports to be sure all activity looks appropriate.
   3. Compare the Stock Ledger reports with the Stock Ledger spreadsheet report. All totals on the individual reports should match the fields in the spreadsheet.
4. Close the Sales Month
   1. NOTE: The Daily Update Process is the program that updates the Spreadsheet with ALL changes from that day. This process MUST be run each day, in order for the values in the stock ledger to be accurate. This process is run from PrismCore Admin, within the "Update Stock Ledger" module.
   2. Close the sales month. Be sure you have a good backup from the night before. Do not check the box to "Post Any Remaining Unposted Sales" if you already posted them manually. Check this box if you skipped step B3 above. If you have unposted sales, and want to close the month without posting them, do not check the box. A dialogue will appear, stating, "Unposted sales exist. Do you want to post these sales before closing the month?". If you do NOT want to post, say No. If you do wish to post, say yes. NOTE: This is the last chance you have to cancel the process. Once you close the sales month, it cannot be reversed.
   3. If you are told that you have Open Buyback Invoices, enter through this error and it will stop this process. You must go to Invoice Goods. Do a quick search by Invoice Number, and search for "BB". This will take you down the list of invoices to any that begin with BB (buyback). You must close this (these) invoices.
   4. Note: If you have any questions as to whether the month was closed or not, go to the "Close Sales Month" module. The system will not allow you to close a current month, and, if the month is eligible to be closed, you can see the number of the month you are closing at this screen.
   5. If you use Moving Average or FIFO Inventory Valuation Methods, skip this step. If you use Standard Retail Inventory Valuation Method run cost of goods. Enter the month and year of the month you closed.
   6. All Inventory Valuation Methods: Run the 'Calculate Inventory Variation' process. Enter the month and year of the month that you closed. Standard Retail has an option to choose either actual or desired margin for variation calculations.
   7. Since we want to run the inventory variation process for all DCC's, leave this area set to "All DCC"s". Click the "Calculate Inventory Variance" button. This will bring up a prompt "Are you sure you want to calculate inventory variance?" Click Yes.
   8. Review the Stock Ledger Spreadsheet Report and the Inventory Variation Reports. Call PrismCore ICS Support, as soon as you can, if there are any discrepancies or if you have any questions.

Closing the Sales Month Procedure

If all of the steps listed in the Monthly Sales Procedures have been reviewed, the sales month can be closed.

NOTE: Closing the sales month is a single user process. You must be logged out of PrismCore Admin in order to close the month, and all users other than yourself must be logged out of PrismCore and/or PrismCore Admin before you can begin closing the sales month.

1. Enter the Close Sales Month module.
   
2. Check that the date is correct for the sales month to be closed. If necessary, check the "Post any remaining Unposted Sales" checkbox. When finished, press the Start button.
3. If there are unposted sales, the following dialog displays:
   
   
   
   Yes will post any unposted sales to the current month before closing the month.
   No will not post the unposted sales.
   Cancel will take you back to the Close Sales Month module without posting sales or closing the sales month.
   
   
4. When the process is complete, the following message displays:
   
    
   NOTE: If there are unposted buyback invoices in your system, and the "BB Invoices must be closed for month end" parameter in PrismCore Admin/General Parameters has been checked, the following dialog will appear when you try to close the sales month: 
    
5. Click "OK". Search for the unposted buyback invoices in the Invoice Goods module (you can search on Status/Subsystem/Type to find all unposted buyback invoices). Post the invoices, and then you will be able to try again to close the sales month. 
6. You cannot close a sales month before the 25^th of the month. This is to prevent accidental closings. If you access this module before the 25^th, you will receive the following message.
   
7. If you do not close the sales month by the first day of the next calendar month, the message Current Sales Month is not the current month will appear whenever you open a module. This is a reminder to close the sales month so that sales can begin posting to the next month. 

Reminder: Sales for general merchandise and trade books are recorded by month. Sales for textbooks are recorded by both month and by term. Closing a term and parameters at Term Maintenance controls when textbook sales post to a term, and closing a sales month controls the month in which sales are recorded for all items.