Reconciling accounts payable
- What approval costs a month
- $4,300.80
- Hours on routine handling
- 120
- Hours on exceptions
- 14.4
Every figure on this page is computed from the inputs entered, by the method stated below it. Monthendly publishes no benchmark close time, no industry average DPO and no accounting standard: the tasks, the minutes, the rate and the exception rate are yours, and the defaults are a worked example to replace with your own figures.
Reconciling accounts payable means proving that the list of what you owe your suppliers agrees with what the ledger says you owe in total. It sounds mechanical and it is the check that most often finds a real error, because the two sides are built differently: the subsidiary ledger is invoice by invoice, and the control account is the sum of what was posted. When they disagree, something was posted to the control account directly, an invoice was entered twice, a credit note went one side only, or a payment was allocated to the wrong supplier. This page is how the reconciliation runs, what the differences usually are, and why it has to happen before the month closes.
Open the Accounts payable invoice approval process Free to use. No account, no card, no sign-up.
Take both sides at the same moment
The aging at the cut-off and the control account balance at the same cut-off. Most reconciliations that will not tie are comparing two different moments, and finding that out early saves an afternoon.
Explain each difference, do not net them
A reconciliation that arrives at zero by offsetting two unexplained differences has proved nothing. Each difference gets a reason: a duplicate, a misallocated payment, a manual journal, a credit note posted one side only.
Fix it in the ledger, not the spreadsheet
The reconciliation is evidence, not a correction. Whatever it finds should be posted, so next month starts from a balance that is right rather than one that is right once you apply the note at the bottom of a sheet.
Reconciling accounts payable: common questions
What if it will not tie? Work backwards from the largest unexplained difference rather than reading every line. Duplicates and misallocated payments account for most of them in small teams, and both show up quickly when you sort by amount.
Can this be automated? Matching the two sides can be. Explaining a difference is a judgement and should stay one: an automated reconciliation that clears differences by rule is a reconciliation that will one day hide something.
Does it have to happen before sign-off? Yes, in any close worth the name. The payables balance is on the statements you are signing off, and an unreconciled balance means you do not yet know that it is right.
Will it do what you need for Reconciling accounts payable?
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