Fully Reconciled Trial Balance

If this is part of our terms and conditions with you as a client of ours, this will ensure that we can provide our services at the level of fees we have agreed.

Failure to provide all the information at the standard agreed will result in the records being passed back to you for correction or we will agree additional fees with you should you wish us to correct them on your behalf:

1. The opening balances provided to you must have been posted and there are no other back postings into the previous year. The opening position should match last year’s final accounts
2. There should be no balances on the suspense, mis-postings or historical adjustments account
3. All bank accounts, including current and deposit accounts, must have been reconciled to the bank statements using the facility within the bookkeeping software package you use. There should be no items more than 6 months old which have not been agreed to the bank statements
4. All credit cards, mortgages and loan accounts must be reconciled to the statements using the facility within the bookkeeping software package you use
5. The nominal petty cash balance must have been agreed to the balance of petty cash held at the period end (i.e. ‘cash in the tin’)
6. All sales invoices must have been entered relating to the accounting period. Please let us know if you have invoiced customers during the period for any services that are provided after the period end (Deferred income) or if you have raised sales invoices after the period end for any services you did provide in the accounting period (Accrued income)
7. All purchases and expense invoices must have been entered relating to the accounting period. Please let us know if you have prepaid for any goods and services that are used after the period end (Prepaid expenses) or received an invoice after the period end for any goods and services used in the accounting period (Accrued expenses)
8. All of the debtor and creditor balances must agree with the records of the customers and suppliers respectively. You must review the aged debtors/receivable report and the aged creditors/payable report to ensure you agree with the balances. Please let us know if there are any bad debts
9. The factoring or invoice discounting account must reconcile to the statement covering the period end
10. All wages journals must be posted. The net wages balance must agree to the amounts owed to employees at the period end. This balance will usually be zero
11. The PAYE, National Insurance and CIS creditor or debtor must agree to the total amount owed to/from HM Revenue & Customs at the period end
12. The VAT balance must agree to the VAT Return for the period end, or the balance for the period since the last VAT Return (if the VAT Return period is not the same as the year end).  If you are on cash accounting or the flat rate scheme, this will not agree and we would expect that you use the VAT facility in the software

Supporting information required from all clients

Please then provide us with the following supporting records, where applicable, in support of the trial balance:

1. Copy of period end bank statements for all bank accounts, including current and deposit
2. Copy of credit card statements for all credit cards covering the period end date
3. Copy of mortgage or loan statements for all accounts covering the period end date
4. Copy of any new hire purchase, loan or lease agreements started in the period
5. Copy of VAT returns submitted to HMRC, if not available in your bookkeeping software
6. If A4G do not prepare your payroll, copy of the payroll reports and P32’s
7. Copy of any subcontractor statements where your business has suffered CIS deductions
8. If not all purchase and expense invoices, at least a copy of those for all fixed asset additions and for legal/professional fees, repairs costs and sundry costs greater than £250
9. Disposal details for any fixed assets sold or scrapped during the period
10. Copy of the mileage log(s) covering business journeys travelled in any vehicles owed personally
11. Confirmation of any closing stock and or work in progress at the period end date

Please note that the list of supporting information is not exhaustive and you may have other accounting issues that need to be considered. If you have any other supporting records that you think we may need, please provide these and we can extract the information where required. Your client manager will give you a call to discuss any other information we need or queries we have.

The above information can be provided to us in several ways, including electronically by uploading to our portal or directly into xero. Please contact us should you need any assistance with this.

Please note that without the supporting information we will be unable to start work on your accounts.