Admin Panel: Accounting Settings

Admin Panel: Accounting Settings

Overview

The Accounting Settings page in the CustomBooks™ Admin Panel is the central hub for defining how your system handles financial data. Here, you can establish your core accounting method, define reporting parameters, map default system actions to your General Ledger, and secure your historical data by closing the books.

Accounting Method

At the very top of the page, you can set your primary Accounting Method. Choose between the Cash or Accrual accounting method. This selection dictates the default accounting basis used across your CustomBooks™ environment.
  1. Note: The Accounting Method selected here is also used as the default Accounting Method for Reports: General Settings—but it can be changed at the report level.
  2. For more details about Cash Basis method of accounting, and Cash Basis: Cash with Inventory Tracking and Cash without Inventory Tracking, go to this knowledge base article.


Reporting Settings

This section controls how your financial data is presented and how posting periods are handled.
  1. Reporting method(s): This is set to Accrual Only (if the Accrual accounting method is selected globally) or Accrual and Cash (if the Cash accounting method is selected).
  2. Variant of Cash basis Reporting method: Choose either Cash Previous Version (only available for accounts created from 2025 and below), Cash with Inventory Tracking, or Cash without Inventory Tracking.
  3. First month of financial year (fiscal): Set the starting month for your company's fiscal year.
  4. Future reporting/posting years allowed: Define how many years into the future users are permitted to post transactions.


Default Accounts

The Default Accounts section maps specific system functions (like receiving payments or tracking inventory) to their corresponding General Ledger (GL) accounts. It allows you to designate standard accounts for standard account types (such as Bank accounts, AR/AP, Inventory, and Equity) and set their Upgraded Cash basis equivalents to ensure accurate automated journaling.


Account Types

This area governs the structure, coding, and behavior of your Chart of Accounts. Users can opt to use account codes beyond the GAAP standard numerical range, include alphabetical and special characters, and extend the code limit.
  1. Account Structure: The GAAP standard code range start is listed after each account type.
  2. Settings Panel: Use the side panel to customize your account numbering rules:
  3. Enable manual change of the ranges: You can enable the ability to change these GAAP ranges manually.
  4. Allow Code outside of GAAP standard numerical range: You can allow codes outside of the standard GAAP ranges by using this toggle. When off, standard GAAP codes are strictly enforced.
  5. Maximum code length: The code length can be limited by entering a number in this field.
  6. Auto-generated Code Increments: For code auto-generation, set the numerical increment here.
  7. Allow alphabetical characters: To allow alphabetic characters in your codes, slide this toggle to on.
  8. Allow special characters: To allow special characters, slide this toggle on.


1099 Settings

Manage your vendor tax reporting preferences here. You can click to view your list of 1099 categories and set the Latest tax year for generating 1099 reports.


Tax Lines Settings

Configure how your system exports tax data. You can view your list of tax lines, set the latest tax year for your tax lines export, and assign a default tax form to be used for these lines.


Closing the Books

Protect your historical financial data by restricting changes to transactions dated prior to a specific date.
  1. Closing Date: Set a global closing date, or check the box to specify different closing dates per individual module (e.g., locking Bills but leaving Bank Transfers open).
  2. Warning Type: Choose the security level for users attempting to modify closed periods. You can set the system to Only warn the user, or Warn and require password to enforce stricter control.



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