An Accounting Period defines a time period for which financial statements are recorded and frozen.
In ERPNext, an Accounting Period is used to close and lock a period that has already ended. Once created, the submittable transactions selected in it (such as Sales Invoice, Purchase Invoice, Stock Entry, Payroll Entry, Journal Entry, etc.) that are marked “Closed” can no longer be created, amended, or cancelled with a posting date inside that period.
Why is Accounting Period needed?
When transactions are submitted, they affect the ledgers and the reports that process the ledger data. This can cause issues when financial reports have to be generated for audit by authorities or when closing the books for a financial year.
An Accounting Period is used to lock a period that has already ended, so that new or amended transactions cannot alter reports that have already been finalized for that period.
How to create an Accounting Period
- Enter a name for the Accounting Period.
- Define the time frame by setting the Start Date and End Date.
- Add or remove transactions in the table. All transactions listed with the “Closed” option checked will be restricted once the Accounting Period’s End Date has passed.
- Save and Submit.
Note: The End Date of an Accounting Period cannot be a future date. ERPNext only allows an Accounting Period to be saved once the period it covers has actually ended. For example, if today is 9 July 2026, you cannot create an Accounting Period with an End Date of 31 July 2026 until 1 August 2026 or later.
When to create an Accounting Period
An Accounting Period is meant to close a period after it has ended, not to reserve or pre-restrict a period that is still in progress. Because of this:
- You cannot save an Accounting Period whose End Date is later than today’s date. Attempting to do so raises a validation error.
- Until an Accounting Period is created for a given month, ERPNext relies on the active Fiscal Year, and transactions dated within that month can be posted normally - they are not restricted by an Accounting Period.
- If you need to prevent backdated or unauthorized entries in a month that hasn’t ended yet, don’t try to pre-create its Accounting Period. Instead, restrict Cancel and Amend permissions to a few authorized users, and set Accounts Frozen Upto in Accounts Settings to control which dates users can post to.
What if the "Closed" option for the selected transactions used for?
The “Closed” option in the child table is used to select which transactions should be restricted after the Accounting Period’s End Date. If the Accounting Period ends and a selected transaction doesn’t have “Closed” checked, it will not be restricted after the Accounting Period ends.
If you try to save a closed transaction with a posting date inside an Accounting Period whose End Date has passed, you will see a validation error preventing you from doing so.
Note: No role can save or submit the restricted transactions once the Accounting Period has closed them - even the role set in “Role Allowed to Set Frozen Accounts & Edit Frozen Entries” in Accounts Settings.
If you try to save a closed transaction after its Accounting Period ends, you will see a validation error preventing you from doing so.
Note: No role can save or submit transactions defined in the Accounting Period, even the Role set in 'Role Allowed to Set Frozen Accounts & Edit Frozen Entries' in Account Settings.
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