Skip to content
woodfrog
Data Foundations
FinanceUse case, not a client story

Stop month-end close eating two weeks of spreadsheets.

Every month your finance team pulls the ledger, the bank statements, the sales data and the GST data into spreadsheets and ticks them off line by line. It takes days, and the numbers arrive after the decisions they were meant to inform. We build pipelines that reconcile it every day, so the close is a review, not a rebuild.

Today's reconciliationSchematic
3.8×Target return in 12 months
Week 1Fixed-fee audit
6 weeksTo the first live result
3Senior people on the work
TypeUse case: what we build, not a client story
ForFinance teams in mid-sized or small businesses who close the books in spreadsheets
EngagementWeek 1 audit, then build in about six weeks, fixed scope, fixed fee
Runs onYour ledger (Tally, SAP or similar), bank files and sales data, in a store in your own cloud
The problem

The books close late because the checking starts late.

Nothing is checked during the month. When it ends, the team exports from every system and starts matching: ledger against bank, invoices against receipts, sales against GST data. Each mismatch means a hunt through emails and files. By the time the numbers are signed off, the month that follows is half over.

Invoices checked by hand, one by one
Invoices checked by hand, one by one
What was broken
  • Reconciliation happens once a month, so every mismatch from 30 days arrives at once.
  • The matching lives in spreadsheets with formulas only one person understands.
  • Bank, ledger and sales systems use different references, so matching is done by eye.
  • Errors found late are expensive: a wrong entry from week one has fed every report since.
  • Senior finance people spend the close checking rows instead of reading the numbers.
You might be here if
  • Your close takes more than a week, and most of it is matching.
  • Your team works late in the first days of every month.
  • Leadership sees last month's numbers in the middle of this month.
  • One person holds the reconciliation spreadsheet, and nobody else can run it.

Why it mattered. Late numbers mean late decisions. Commonly cited finance surveys put the typical close at well over a week; every one of those days is spent looking backwards.

The approach

Reconcile every day, not once a month.

In Week 1 we sit with your team through a close and write down every match they make, every rule they apply and every exception they chase. Then we build pipelines that pull the same data every night, apply the same rules and put only the exceptions in front of a person. Your finance team decides the rules and signs off. We build and run the checks.

Every match written down as a rule
Every match written down as a rule
Your data
Ledger
Bank files
Sales and GST data
woodfrog method
Land it nightlyEvery source, same time
Match by your rulesWritten down in Week 1
Route the exceptionsEach to a named owner
What changes
Daily matched balances
A short exceptions list
A trail for every match
A close that is a review
Deliberately not donePosting entries or signing off. People keep those decisions.
Your team sets the rules and signs off. The pipelines do the matching.schematic
The solution

Finance pipelines that check themselves.

What we build
  • Nightly feeds from your ledger, bank files and sales systems into one store in your own cloud.
  • Matching rules taken from how your team works today, written down and versioned, not hidden in formulas.
  • Daily reconciliations: ledger against bank, invoices against ledger, sales against GST data.
  • An exceptions list each morning, with every item assigned to a named person.
  • A trail from every balance back to the source records, ready for your auditors to read.
  • A close checklist that shows what is already matched before the month ends.
Everything sits in your own accounts and repositories, and your team can change a rule without us. We make no claim about your statutory compliance; the pipelines make your existing checks faster and easier to trace.
How it would runThe first close after the build runs in parallel with the old spreadsheets, so your team can compare. Operate is open-ended and drawn at one week only to fit.
The impact

What we would measure.

Where the reconciliation work sitsAcross the month, before and after. Darker means more work.
Schematic, no values
Before: nothing is checked until the month ends, then everything at once. After: a little every day, and the close is a review.
Return over twelve monthsIllustrative shape, not a result
0×1×2×3×4×3× targetMonth 036912
Audit, then build: about six weeksOperate: return tracked every month

Measured on your own numbers, the same way as the baseline. The promise is at least 3× within 12 months of delivery.

What we would measure on a real engagementWhat we would measure
Working days to closeCounted for the last three closes, then every close after
Share of items matched before month endFrom the daily reconciliation
Exceptions per dayAnd how long each stays open
Hours spent matching by handLogged by your own team, before and after
Return on the engagementTarget: at least 3.8× within 12 months, measured on your own numbers
Make the close a review, not a rebuild.A short call, or record a message. A person replies within one business day.
Contact usCertified Services Partner, Claude Partner Network