More FI configuration considerations:

Business Area, COA, GL, Fiscal year and Currencies

Business Area is optional and is equivalent to a specific area of responsibility within your company or business segment. BA (Business Area) also allows for internal and external reporting. 

Another configuration requirement for set-up in SAP are the Basic settings consisting of the following: 

• Chart of Accounts(COA)
• Fiscal Year Variants.
• Currencies

The COA(Chart of Accounts) lists all General Ledger accounts that are used by the organization. It is assigned in configuration to each company code and allows for daily General Ledger postings.

The General Ledger accounts are made up of such data as account number, company code, a description of the account ,  classification of whether the account is a P & L Statement Account or a Balance Sheet Account.

• Control data of the GL Account is where currency is specified, Tax category (posting without tax allowed) ,  marking the account as a reconciliation account ( e.g. Customer, Asset, Vendors, Accounts Receivable) or not.
• Marking the G/L Account  as a “reconciliation” account allows for postings to an Asset Account ( for example) as well as automatic update to the G/L Account.
•  Configuration prevents direct postings to reconciliation accounts thereby assisting in maintaining integrity of the data.
• This allows reconciliation between the sub-ledger and  general ledger to always be guaranteed.
• Within the General Ledger control data , you can also designate whether line item display is possible in the account. The system then stores an entry per line in an index table which links back to the account.  (Display of line item details are then available for reporting purposes ,etc.)
• Open Item Indicators can be set on the G/L Account allowing for better management of open items. Examples include: Bank Clearing Accounts, GR/IR Clearing Accounts, Payroll, etc.

Fiscal Year configuration is a must and can be defined to meet your company’s reporting periods whether Fiscal (any period combination that is not calendar) or Calendar( Jan-Dec).

• Posting Periods are defined and assigned to the Fiscal Year.
• Within the periods you specify start dates and finished dates.
• SAP allows for 12 posting periods along with specially defined periods that can be used for year-end financial closing.

Currencies are another basic configuration setting requirement  which defines your  company’s legal means of payment by country.

• It is recommended that all Currency set-ups in SAP follow the ISO Standards.
• The ISO Standards ensure Global conformity across businesses worldwide utilizing SAP.