Month-End Close Checklist for Controllers (With Accounting Templates)

A fast, clean close isn’t about working harder the last three days of the month. It’s about having a repeatable sequence that everyone on the team follows, with supporting schedules that produce audit-ready output without heroics.

This checklist covers the full close cycle — from cutoff through final signoff — with specific attention to the technical areas (lease accounting, deferred commissions, deferred revenue) where growing companies tend to slow down or make errors.

Before You Start: Prerequisites for a Clean Close

These aren’t close tasks — they’re ongoing hygiene that determines whether your close is a 3-day process or a 10-day scramble:

• Chart of accounts is clean — no catch-all accounts with mystery balances
• Subledgers are maintained — AP, AR, fixed assets, and leases updated throughout the month
• Bank accounts are reconciled weekly, not at month-end
• Expense reports submitted with a hard cutoff 2 business days before month-end
• Prepaid and accrual schedules are maintained in a workbook, not in someone’s head

If any of these are missing, fix them before optimizing the close sequence. You can’t schedule your way out of bad underlying data.

Day 1–2: Cutoff and Data Collection

Revenue cutoff

• Confirm all revenue recognized in the period has a corresponding invoice or contract milestone
• Identify any deals signed in the last 3 days — confirm whether they meet recognition criteria for this period
• Pull deferred revenue balance from the subledger and reconcile to GL

Accounts payable cutoff

• Ensure all vendor invoices received through the last business day of the month are posted
• Accrue for invoices not yet received but for which services were rendered (common: legal, consulting, cloud infrastructure)
• Confirm purchase order cutoff with operations or procurement

Payroll

• Accrue for any wages earned but not paid as of month-end (partial pay periods)
• Confirm payroll taxes and benefits accruals are posted
• Update commission expense accruals — see commissions section below

Bank and credit card cutoff

• Pull final bank statements for the last day of the month
• Post any unrecorded transactions (bank fees, interest income/expense, wire transfers)
• Confirm all credit card charges are imported and coded

Day 2–3: Subledger Reconciliations

Subledger to GL reconciliations are non-negotiable. If these don’t tie, you’re closing on wrong numbers.

Accounts receivable

• AR subledger balance ties to GL
• Aged AR report reviewed — flag anything >90 days for reserve analysis
• Bad debt reserve updated (if using allowance method)
• Credit memos and unapplied cash resolved

Accounts payable

• AP subledger balance ties to GL
• Vendor statements reconciled for key vendors
• Outstanding checks reviewed for stale items (>90 days)

Fixed assets / depreciation

• Additions and disposals posted for the period
• Depreciation run for all assets
• Accumulated depreciation ties to fixed asset subledger
• Confirm any asset retirements or transfers are reflected

Inventory (if applicable)

• Inventory subledger ties to GL
• Physical count adjustments (if cycle count performed) posted
• Obsolescence reserve updated

Day 3–4: Technical Accounting Schedules

This is where growing companies most often lose time. These schedules need to be maintained systematically — not rebuilt from scratch each month.

Deferred commissions (ASC 606 / ASC 340-40)

If your company capitalizes sales commissions, you need a working schedule that:

• Tracks each commission payment with its amortization method and term
• Calculates the current-period amortization expense
• Generates the journal entries (capitalization + amortization)
• Produces a rollforward that ties to the deferred commission asset on the balance sheet

Month-end checklist:

• New commission payments entered into the schedule
• Period amortization calculated and journal entry posted
• Deferred commission asset balance per schedule ties to GL
• Any deal amendments or reversals reflected

If this is being done in a manual spreadsheet and taking more than 2 hours, it’s time for a structured workbook. The ASC 606 Commission Accrual Workbook handles this for up to 50 deals with automated journal entries and a reconciliation tab.

Lease accounting (ASC 842)

For each active lease:

• Monthly journal entry generated (operating: single lease expense; finance: depreciation + interest)
• Lease liability balance per amortization schedule ties to GL
• ROU asset balance per schedule ties to GL
• Any new leases commenced this period — initial recognition entry posted
• Any leases modified or terminated — remeasurement entry posted

For multi-lease portfolios, a structured workbook is essential. The ASC 842 Lease Accounting Workbook handles 20 leases with period-level journal entry aggregation and balance sheet reconciliation.

Prepaid expenses

• Prepaid schedule updated with new payments
• Monthly amortization entries posted for each prepaid
• Prepaid balance per schedule ties to GL
• Any prepaids fully amortized removed from the schedule

Accrued liabilities

• Recurring accruals posted (insurance, rent, professional fees)
• One-time accruals reviewed and posted with appropriate documentation
• Prior-period accruals reversed if appropriate
• Accrued liabilities schedule ties to GL

Deferred revenue (if applicable)

• Deferred revenue schedule updated for new billings
• Revenue recognized this period calculated per schedule
• Deferred revenue balance per schedule ties to GL
• Any contract modifications or cancellations reflected

Day 4–5: Income Statement Review

Before you close, read the P&L. Not as a list of numbers — as a story.

Revenue

• Revenue by line item vs. prior month — explain any variance >5%
• Revenue vs. budget — document significant variances
• Deferred revenue movement ties to revenue recognized

Cost of goods sold / cost of revenue

• Gross margin % vs. prior period — explain movement
• Any unusual items or one-time charges flagged

Operating expenses

• Each expense line vs. prior month and budget
• Headcount-driven costs (payroll, benefits) reviewed against headcount changes
• Confirm no items were miscoded to the wrong account

Below-the-line items

• Interest expense ties to debt schedule
• Depreciation ties to fixed asset schedule
• Lease expense (operating) or depreciation + interest (finance) ties to lease schedule
• Commission amortization ties to deferred commission schedule

Day 5: Balance Sheet Review

Run a balance sheet as of the last day of the month and review every line:

Assets

• Cash ties to bank reconciliation
• AR ties to subledger
• Prepaid ties to prepaid schedule
• Deferred commissions tie to commission schedule
• ROU assets tie to lease schedule
• Fixed assets (net) tie to fixed asset subledger

Liabilities

• AP ties to subledger
• Accrued liabilities tie to accrual schedule
• Deferred revenue ties to deferred revenue schedule
• Lease liabilities tie to lease schedule
• Debt ties to debt schedule

Equity

• Retained earnings roll properly (prior month RE + current period net income)
• Any equity transactions (stock comp, issuances) reflected correctly

Day 5–6: Flux Analysis

A flux analysis (variance analysis) is a line-by-line explanation of what changed and why. It serves two purposes: catching errors before they become audit findings, and building institutional knowledge about your business.

For each significant P&L and balance sheet line:

Any line that can’t be explained by a known business event warrants investigation before the books are closed.

Day 6–7: Final Review and Signoff

• Trial balance reviewed by controller — no unusual balances
• Intercompany eliminations confirmed (if applicable)
• All journal entries have supporting documentation
• Management review package drafted (P&L, BS, cash flow, key metrics)
• Prior-period adjustments documented with materiality assessment
• Books locked in accounting system

Cutting Your Close Time

If your close is taking 10+ business days, the bottlenecks are almost always:

1. Manual schedules that get rebuilt each month — deferred commissions, leases, prepaids. Structured workbooks cut this to minutes.
2. Late expense reports — enforce a hard cutoff. Even one day earlier creates significant downstream time.
3. Subledger discipline — AR and AP reconciliations should be a daily or weekly task, not a monthly scramble.
4. No flux analysis template — analyzing variances without a standard template means starting from scratch. Build one and reuse it.

The goal is a 5-day close where Day 6 is review, not catch-up.

Templates That Support the Close

Two of the most time-consuming close tasks — deferred commission accounting and lease accounting — are handled by our workbooks:

ASC 606 Commission Accrual Workbook — $79 Handles 50 deals with three amortization methods, automated journal entries, rollforward, and reconciliation.

ASC 842 Lease Accounting Workbook — $97 Handles 20 leases (operating + finance), 120-month amortization schedule, period journal entries, and balance sheet reconciliation.

Both are pure Excel — no macros, no setup, no subscription. Download and use in the same close cycle.

KDesk Accounting builds audit-ready Excel tools for finance teams. Browse all templates →