Close management: requirements checklist
From the guide at bestfinancesoftware.com/guides/close-management, published 29 October 2026. Use your browser's print command; the site header and footer are left off the page.
| Requirement | Vendor A | Vendor B | Vendor C |
|---|
| Must have |
|---|
| A close checklist with owners, reviewers, due dates and dependencies, rolled forward each period. | | | |
| Balance sheet reconciliations that pull balances from your ERP and hold support files beside each one. | | | |
| Preparer and reviewer sign-off with time stamps that an auditor can rely on. | | | |
| A read-only auditor view, or an export of the evidence for a given account and period. | | | |
| A tested connection to your ERP, named in the order form. | | | |
| Depends on you |
|---|
| Transaction matching, if you reconcile high volumes of bank, card or payment processor activity. | | | |
| Journal entry workflow with approval, if entries are prepared outside the ERP. | | | |
| Flux or variance analysis with commentary, if management asks why balances moved. | | | |
| Controls testing and risk modules, if internal audit will use the same tool. | | | |
Questions to ask in the demo
- Pull our trial balance from our ERP and show the reconciliation for one bank account, with support attached.
- Show the auditor's view of that reconciliation, including who prepared and reviewed it, and when.
- What happens when a balance changes after sign-off?
- Show how the checklist rolls forward and how a late task is flagged.
- How do you match transactions from our payment processor, and what does an exception look like?
- What do we export, with what history, if we leave?
Back to the guide, with the reasons behind each item and the vendors described from their own pages.