Fiscal Year

Fiscal Year

A Fiscal Year is the 12-month period your books cover. Most Dutch businesses use calendar year (1 Jan – 31 Dec), but you can configure any 12-month period.

Where to set it

Fiscal Year → [year] (e.g., "2026") — set during Setup Wizard, edited later from this record.

Adding next year's Fiscal Year

Before the new year starts, create the next Fiscal Year:

1. Fiscal Year → New
2. Year label, Start Date (e.g., 2027-01-01), End Date (2027-12-31)
3. Save

Now ERPNext can post transactions to that year.

What the Fiscal Year drives

• Reports — default date ranges on P&L and Balance Sheet
• Period Closing — the year-end procedure operates on this
• Document numbering — Naming Series can include .fy. for fiscal-year codes (e.g., INV-.fy.-#### → INV-2526-0001)

Year-end closing

At the end of each Fiscal Year:

1. Reconcile all bank accounts
2. Run the VAT Return for Q4
3. Verify P&L and Balance Sheet match expectations
4. Run Period Closing Voucher:
   • Posting Date — last day of the year
   • Closing Account Head — Retained Earnings (or your equivalent)
   • Submit
5. This zeros out Income and Expense accounts and transfers the net to Retained Earnings

After closing, you can still view old data but generally shouldn't post to closed periods. ERPNext can be configured to block backdated postings via Accounts Settings → Period Closing Voucher Restrict.

Tax-period closing vs fiscal-year closing

These are different:

• VAT Return quarterly — see VAT Return
• Fiscal Year closing annually — this page

Both happen, on different schedules.

Mid-year changes

You can switch to a different Fiscal Year structure (e.g., April–March), but it's invasive — talk to your accountant. The cleanest path:

1. Close current Fiscal Year early at month-end with Period Closing
2. Set up the new Fiscal Year starting next day
3. Going forward, everything uses new structure

Multiple Fiscal Years open

ERPNext supports multiple Fiscal Years simultaneously. Typical scenario:

• Current year (2026) — open, posting
• Next year (2027) — open, allows post-dated transactions and Sales Orders with delivery in 2027
• Previous year (2025) — technically open until you close it; in practice, no new postings

Common situations

• Forgot to create next year before Jan 1 — create now; backdate any January transactions
• Year-end audit adjustments — your accountant gives you journal entries to post on Dec 31; post in the open period before running Period Closing
• Restating prior year — generally don't reopen a closed Fiscal Year; instead, post correction entries in the current year with notes