To close a fiscal year

Print all the reports that you wish to keep that show the previous year's transaction activity. You might consider printing a copy of each journal, because they show all transaction activity for a specified period.

Make at least one backup of your company file. Clearly mark this backup and put it in storage as part of your permanent records.

Warning: Make a backup before closing the fiscal year!
It's very important that you make a backup before continuing. After you start a new fiscal year, the only way to view the detail of transactions that were purged from the company file during the start a new year process is to restore a backup of the company file.

To ensure that the backup you make is a reliable backup, we recommend, that as a test, you restore the backup before you start the new fiscal year in your company file.

We also recommend that you make multiple backups of your company file - that is, more than one copy of your company file at different locations. The purpose of multiple backups is simple: backups can fail as easily as computers. If the backed-up file is damaged, you're in just as much trouble as you would be without any backup at all.

Choose Start a New Year from the File menu, and then choose Start a New Fiscal Year from the sub-menu that appears.

Follow the instructions that appear on your computer screen.

Warning: Fiscal years probably shouldn't be changed
Once you've established your fiscal year, you are legally limited in your ability to make changes to it. For example, if your fiscal year begins on February 1st, you may not be able to move it to March 1st. Consult your accountant or an MYOB Certified Consultant before considering any such change. (To locate an MYOB Certified Consultant in your area, see http://www.myob.com/us/service/consultants/index.htm.

In BusinessBasics, and according to the standard used by most accountants, fiscal years take the name of the calendar year in which they end. For example, if your fiscal year is from October 1st, 2001, to September 30th, 2002, that year is referred to as "fiscal year 2002."

After you start a new fiscal year, we recommend that you optimize and verify your company file. Optimizing your company file reduces your company file's size and makes your company file more efficient. The Verify Company File utility checks your company file for errors and ensures that your company file is in "healthy" working condition.

Note: Optimizing and verifying may take a while
The amount of time needed to optimize and verify a company file for use with MYOB BusinessBasics depends upon the size of the file and the capabilities of the computer you're using. If you have a very large company file and a slower computer with little memory, be prepared for optimization and verification to take some time.