The classified skeleton of a main account is the responsibility of the controller from the customer side and the application consultant from the partner side, who bridges the application capabilities to the customers' requirements. This activity is designed in the analysis and design phases and deployed in the deployment phase.

Main accounts are at the core of financial reporting and include the trial balance, balance sheet, income statement, working capital, and cash flow. The starting point in building COAs is identifying the financial reporting requirements to ensure that all classification levels and categories are captured in Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations. The quality of reports build on the details that are captured during data entry and will be reflected in the quality of reporting.

In the following section, we will discuss the major control point of the general ledger module. Focusing on two perspectives, the first is controlling the main accounts, and the second is general ledger parameters. These controls gives the controller the ability to have an oversight of the execution of daily transactions.  

As seen in the following figure, Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations offers three main groups of controls over the main accounts. The first is specific to debit and credit controls, the second to account administration, and the third to posting validation:

Since the previous version of Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, Microsoft has introduced a new concept called shared financial data, which reduces the effort and time of deployment in a multiple-company environment and operational maintenance. A group of companies can share the same chart of accounts, currencies, and dimensions—this decreases the operation time. For example, a new main account will be available to all companies. The following figure explains the concept of shared financial data in detail:

 

The financial data that will be shared between the companies is as follows:

• Chart of accounts (COA): This contains the main account, the COA could be one shared COA between all legal entities, or a COA for one legal entity or group of legal entities. This is all dependent on customer requirements, and the...

Here, we will look at the process of financial management through the opening balance and various daily transactions.

When a company migrates to Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations from a legacy ERP solution, one of the important data migration tasks is the creation of opening balances in the new system. This process is moving the financial balance to Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, which represents the base of organization financial reporting, so that the opening balance must be executed properly to ensure it is audit-compliant and matches customer reporting requirements.

The opening balance building blocks consist of four main blocks, which...

In this chapter, we discussed the practices in the financial implementations of Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations. We focused on the general ledger, covering the types of main accounts, classifications, and control points. We also explained shared financial data. We also learned about opening balance best practices, daily transactions, global general ledger, Microsoft Excel integration. We then moved to the financial period close functionality and the monthly closing procedure.

In the next chapter, we will cover financial dimensions and practice practical reporting in Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations.