Month-end Reporting

Managing Budgets, Forecasting and Reporting Process Overview

1. Carry out month-end activity

It is important that all transactions are processed appropriately prior to the month-end. Refer to the Departmental Checklist and Timetable for Key Tasks (69kb) or month-end Guide, Checklist and Timetables for guidance. This includes:

Receipting
Raising purchase orders
Review of donations deferral
Review of posting of ‘goods received not invoiced accruals’ etc

The System Update email issued weekly from the Finance Division includes a reminder each month of the activity required and the associated deadlines. Please contact the Communications Team if you wish to be added to the distribution list for this communication.

2. Run month-end reports

As per the Reports Library: Monthly Reporting, it is important to run a number of key reports including:

Open Purchase Orders
Invoices on Hold
Income & Expenditure report

3. Adjust transactions

Where the reports identify incomplete transactions it is important to manage these transactions appropriately and where necessary generate correcting journals. You should maintain a full audit trail and supporting documentation for such journals. This can be done by running and filing an Print an Audit Report in the General Ledger (261kb), or by completing a Journal Log (84kb).
If you are unclear about how to handle any of the incomplete transactions please contact the Financials Helpdesk (financials@admin.ox.ac.uk).

4. Identify accruals

Accruals are required, as a minimum, for committed values over £100k. Refer to the Accruals process documents for further detail on the accrual requirements and how to manage these. Your Divisional Financial Controller can also provide advice.

5. Month-end close

As per the Finance Month-End Timetable (84kb), the Financial Reporting Team will closedown each module in Oracle Financials. A new period will be opened at the beginning of the month and the Oracle Financials home page will be updated to reflect this. After the scheduled date it is important that no further transactions are processed in that period. Month-end deadlines are also included in the weekly System Update email.

6. Income and Expenditure (I&E) reports

Mid-level Income and Expenditure reports (providing analysis of the main income and cost categories) are generated by the Financial Reporting Team and issued via email to Departmental Administrators on working day 8 of each month.

More detailed I&E reports should be run within departments. It is important that these and any other reports generated for month end should be reviewed by the Head of Department. Major mis-postings and other such errors should be flagged to your Divisional Financial Controller.

7. Month-end reconciliation

Reconciliations are carried out that ensure completeness and accuracy of balance sheet data on Oracle Financials, and that any issues are identified.