Lock periods and close the year

Lock the books through a date so a filed period cannot change, and close a financial year into Retained Earnings.

Once a month's GST return is filed or a year's accounts are signed, the figures behind them must not move. A period lock stops anything dated on or before a day from being posted. Close financial year moves the year's profit into Retained Earnings and locks the books through the year end.

Before you start: you need Can close periods under Accounting ledger on the Roles page. It is separate from Can post entries, so a bookkeeper who posts entries cannot reopen a period that has been filed. The workspace owner can always do it.

Note: If you don't see this yet, the owner applies the waiting workspace upgrade — see Upgrade your workspace.

Lock a period

  1. Open Accounting › Overview. Beside the period switch you see Books open — any date can be posted, or Books locked through .
  2. Click Lock a period (or Change lock).
  3. In Lock a period, set Locked through — for example 30 Sep 2026 after filing September's GSTR-3B. The date cannot be in the future.
  4. Click Lock. A toast says "Books locked through 30 Sep 2026".

To remove the lock, open Change lock and click Unlock all, or set an earlier date.

What the lock does

Nothing dated on or before the lock can be posted by any route — by hand, by spreadsheet import, by bank reconciliation, by issuing or paying invoices and bills, or by payroll. The attempt is refused with a message such as "the books are locked through 30 Sep 2026 — entries dated on or before it can't be posted".

Corrections still work:

  • Reversing an entry from a locked period posts the reversal today, and its memo says the original period is locked. The filed period stays exactly as filed.
  • Cancelling an issued invoice, or removing a payment against one, reverses its posting today in the same way.

Note: Opening balances cannot be set inside a locked period. Move the lock first.

Every change to the lock is recorded in the workspace audit log, with who changed it and when.

Close a financial year

  1. On Accounting › Overview, click Close financial year.
  2. Year ends on defaults to the latest year end — 31 March for books kept in INR, 31 December otherwise.
  3. Read the preview. For each currency it shows Income, Expenses and the amount going To Retained Earnings.
  4. Click Close year and confirm Close this financial year?.

AxisIQ posts one closing entry per currency, dated the year end. Every income and expense account with a balance up to that day goes to zero, and the net profit (or loss) goes to Retained Earnings. If you have no Retained Earnings account yet, one is created under equity. The books then lock through the year end.

For example, with income of ₹42,60,000 and expenses of ₹35,10,000 for FY 2025-26, the closing entry moves ₹7,50,000 to Retained Earnings on 31 Mar 2026.

What you see afterwards:

  • The profit and loss report for the closed year still shows its result.
  • The balance sheet shows the profit inside Retained Earnings instead of under Profit not yet closed to equity — never both.

Important: Accounts with a balance but no kind are not closed. The dialog warns about them; give them a kind in the chart of accounts first.

Reopen a year

Open Close financial year, pick the closed year end ("This year is closed") and click Reopen year. The closing entries are reversed and the lock goes back to where it was before the close. A year cannot be reopened while a later lock stands — move that lock first.

Troubleshooting

"the books are already locked through … — move the lock before …" The lock already covers the year end. Move it to before the year end, then close the year.

"There is no income or expense to close up to this day." Nothing to move. Check the date.