Year end accounting checklist planning helps founders close the year with clarity, reduce tax season stress, and start the new year with clean, reliable financials.
Many business owners want to begin January feeling confident about their numbers. They want to know where the business stands, what worked, and what needs to change. That confidence does not come from rushed clean up or last minute fixes. It comes from a structured year end close that reflects reality and supports better decisions.
A strong year end close does more than satisfy tax requirements. It gives leaders the insight they need to plan, grow, and move forward with confidence.
“Year end is where all the little things you meant to clean up during the year finally surface. The checklist helps us make sure nothing gets missed so clients are not dealing with surprises later when it matters most.”
— Jillian Mittelmark, CPA, CEO and Founder, Resolve Works
At Resolve Works, we believe clean books build confident businesses. Year end is your opportunity to reset, gain clarity, and create a strong financial foundation for the year ahead.
Want the full checklist?
Download our Year End Accounting Checklist with more than 40 detailed items built specifically for growing companies.
Access the download by completing the form.
Why a Year End Accounting Checklist Matters More Than You Think
A year end accounting checklist does far more than prepare your business for taxes. It creates structure, accountability, and trust in your financials.
Most companies aim to close their books monthly. In practice, that does not always happen perfectly. Teams get busy. Priorities shift. Transactions pile up. Year end becomes the moment when everything needs attention at once.
A checklist gives that process order.
A well-designed year end accounting checklist helps founders:
- Record activity in the correct accounting period
- Produce accurate and complete financial statements
- Reduce last minute questions from CPAs and tax preparers
- Provide reliable information to investors, lenders, or boards
- Lower risk through consistent review and documentation
“The checklist is not just about closing the books. It gives founders confidence that their financials are complete, accurate, and ready to be shared with a CPA, an investor, or an internal team.”
— Jillian Mittelmark, CPA, CEO and Founder, Resolve Works
Without a checklist, year end becomes reactive. With one, it becomes controlled.
What a Strong Year End Accounting Checklist Covers
Every business operates differently, but most year end accounting checklists focus on the same core areas. These sections work together to ensure the books reflect what actually happened during the year.
Rather than listing every task, the checklist organizes work into logical categories. This approach makes the process easier to manage and harder to overlook.
Year End Logistics and Planning
Year end starts with coordination.
This section focuses on communication and planning across your internal team, your accountant, and your tax preparer. It ensures everyone understands deadlines, reporting requirements, and expectations before the books close.
Strong logistics planning helps businesses:
- Identify special reporting requirements early
- Address one time or unusual transactions in advance
- Avoid delays caused by missing information
- Reduce stress during tax preparation
When teams plan early, year end moves faster and with fewer surprises.
Payroll and Contractor Reporting
Payroll and contractor reporting often create the most risk at year end. These areas involve deadlines, compliance rules, and external filings that cannot be corrected easily once missed.
A year end accounting checklist ensures payroll and contractor items receive proper attention before deadlines pass. It prompts teams to review compensation, benefits, and reporting requirements while there is still time to fix issues.
This step protects both the company and its people.
Balance Sheet Accuracy
The balance sheet tells the story of what your business owns and owes. At year end, every balance must be real, supportable, and correctly classified.
A checklist helps teams slow down and confirm that balances make sense. It encourages review of assets, liabilities, and equity accounts that may have changed throughout the year or lingered without review.
Balance sheet accuracy matters because errors here tend to carry forward. When left unresolved, they compound over time and create confusion later.
Profit and Loss Review
The profit and loss statement shows how the business performed. A year end accounting checklist helps ensure that performance reflects reality.
The checklist guides teams to review how revenue and expenses were recorded and categorized. It helps confirm that results align with how the business actually operates, not just how transactions happened to post.
This review improves the quality of financial insights founders rely on for planning and forecasting.
Tax Readiness
Year end accounting and tax preparation are closely connected, but they are not the same thing.
A strong checklist prepares financials so they are ready for tax filing before the CPA steps in. This approach reduces back and forth, limits last minute questions, and often lowers tax preparation costs.
“When year end is done right, it feels like just another clean close. That only happens when accounting is treated as an ongoing process rather than a once a year scramble.”
— Jillian Mittelmark, CPA, CEO and Founder, Resolve Works
Prepared financials make tax season smoother for everyone involved.
What Happens When Year End Prep Is Skipped
Skipping structured year end preparation rarely saves time. In most cases, it creates more work later.
Without a checklist, companies often face:
- Misstated balances that require correction
- Last minute adjustments during tax preparation
- Higher CPA fees due to clean up work
- Reduced confidence from investors or lenders
- Stressful remediation during audits or diligence
Problems ignored at year end tend to resurface later. When they do, the stakes are usually higher.
How Year End Accounting Supports Smarter Growth
A year end accounting checklist does more than close the books. It creates a foundation for smarter planning and growth.
Clean year end data helps founders:
- Build realistic budgets and forecasts
- Identify trends in revenue, costs, and cash flow
- Understand what truly drove performance
- Set measurable goals for the year ahead
You cannot improve what you cannot measure. Year end clarity gives leaders the information they need to make better decisions all year long.
Why Founders Partner with Resolve Works
Resolve Works helps growing companies move beyond reactive accounting.
We use structured processes and strategic insight to turn year end into part of a larger system. That system keeps financials clean, consistent, and investor ready throughout the year.
Instead of treating year end as a one time event, we help clients build habits and processes that scale with the business.
“Our goal is to help founders build finance functions that scale with their business. We do not just close the year. We help leaders use their numbers to make better decisions year after year.”
— Jillian Mittelmark, CPA, CEO and Founder, Resolve Works
Download the Year End Accounting Checklist
If you want a clear, structured way to close the year with confidence, our Year End Accounting Checklist provides a detailed, accountant built roadmap designed for growing companies.
The checklist covers every major area of the year end close and helps ensure nothing falls through the cracks.
Access the download by completing the form.
Want help executing the checklist or simplifying year end altogether?
Email Resolve Works or Book a Call and make year end a non event.
