Balance sheet settings and reconciliation

This guide explains the structure of the balance sheet in SimplBooks, how to reconcile the balance sheet (find errors), and how to modify balance sheet settings.

📢 Note! Please note that the program closes and opens financial periods automatically (guide). If accounting accounts are added or removed, the account settings for automatic entries must be checked (guide).

Balance sheet structure in SimplBooks

The SimplBooks balance sheet follows the official Finnish balance sheet format. The balance sheet consists of two parts:

  • Assets
    • Fixed assets (long-term assets, e.g., buildings, land)
    • Current assets (short-term assets, e.g., cash in bank accounts, trade receivables)

  • Liabilities and Equity
    • Equity (e.g., share capital, invested unrestricted equity reserves)
    • Accumulated appropriations
    • Mandatory provisions
    • Liabilities (e.g., bank loans, VAT liability)
Balance sheet reconciliation

1. You can find the balance sheet under Accounting > Balance Sheet

2. Select the period you want to review

3. The program will notify you if the balance sheet is out of balance.

The balance sheet must be in balance, meaning the totals on the assets side and the liabilities and equity side must be equal. If this is not the case, there is an error in the bookkeeping that must be identified and corrected.

One way to identify the source of the error is to browse backward through the period until you reach the date when the balance sheet first becomes unbalanced, and then review the entries for that date.

📢 Note! If the balance sheet becomes unbalanced at a period changeover, the cause is likely in the automatic closing entries. See the guide for checking and correcting these here.
Editing balance sheet settings

1. You can edit the balance sheet settings by going to Accounting > Balance Sheet > Actions > View report settings

💡 Tip: You can add report settings or print and export options to your favourites by clicking the star icon. They will then appear in the report’s main view and can be selected quickly.

2. In the view that opens, you can define which accounting accounts appear on the report, set headings, and also restore the report’s default settings.

📢 Note! If you remove accounts from the chart of accounts or add new ones, make sure the account is correctly defined in the balance sheet or income statement settings. If an account has not been added to the balance sheet settings, its balance will not appear on the report and the balance sheet will not reconcile for that account. The accounts in the default chart of accounts are already assigned to the correct positions on the reports. There is a separate written guide for entering opening balances here and a video guide here.

3. The accounts shown on the balance sheet are defined under Accounting > Balance Sheet > Actions > View report settings

Verify that the account number you added appears in the correct location. For example, “1020:1099” means that account numbers within that range appear at that point in the report.

From the end of each row, you can add new rows and sub-rows.

Automatic entry accounts

1. You can view the accounts for automatic entries under Settings > Automatic entries

Verify that accounts have been assigned to all automatic entries in the program settings. If any account for automatic entries is left undefined, the program will not process closing entries and other automatic entries correctly.

Condensed balance sheet

1. You can print a condensed balance sheet, for example for financial statements, by clicking the gear icon under Accounting > Balance Sheet > gear icon

2. Uncheck the “Full report” option

3. From the Filters section, you can also add a comparison period to the report.

If you want, for example, a report showing one column for the most recent year and one column for the previous year, select “Compare to the same period in the previous year” from the filters, and under the gear icon uncheck “Show start date” and “Show changes“.

Other related guides:

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