Year-end close and T2 preparation without the scramble
SeroBooks keeps the books in a state your accountant can close: GIFI-mapped accounts for the T2, CCA on fixed assets, period locks and payroll slips from the same ledger.
Year-end & T2, handled by Sero
T2 and GIFI
Accounts map to GIFI codes so statements are ready for the corporate T2 return.
Fixed assets with CCA
Capital cost allowance by class for Canada; MACRS for US entities.
Year-end close
Close the year and roll retained earnings forward.
Period locks
Lock closed periods so filed numbers cannot drift.
Year-end slips
T4, T4A and T5018 XML from payroll and supplier data.
Free accountant seats
Your accountant works directly in the books at no charge.
One company, one login, three products that share their numbers
SeroBooks
The books, the store, the bank. One ledger.
Accounting that runs the whole business — invoicing, inventory, banking, sales tax, payroll and year-end for Canada and the United States.
SeroPayroll
Payroll for every province. Right to the cent.
Canadian payroll for all 13 provinces and territories — CPP, EI, QPP, vacation, stat holidays, remittances, T4s and ROEs.
SeroPOS
The point of sale built for the rush.
Point of sale for restaurants and retail — tables, kitchen tickets, inventory, loyalty and online ordering on iPad, Android, Windows and Mac.
What year-end really involves
For a Canadian corporation, year-end means closing the books, calculating depreciation, preparing financial statements and filing the T2 corporate income tax return with its GIFI schedules. It also means issuing payroll slips, contractor slips and reconciling a full year of sales tax. Most of the pain comes from cleaning up twelve months of loose ends in a few stressful weeks before the deadlines arrive.
SeroBooks reduces that clean-up by keeping inventory, payroll, banking and tax in one ledger all year. When the year ends, the trial balance already reflects what happened: stock is valued, payroll is posted, bank accounts are reconciled and sales tax ties to the returns you filed, so your accountant starts from a clean position rather than a box of receipts.
GIFI mapping for the T2
The General Index of Financial Information is the CRA’s standard set of codes for balance sheet and income statement lines filed with the T2. SeroBooks maps your chart of accounts to GIFI codes, so your financial statements can be produced in the structure the T2 expects instead of being re-keyed line by line into tax software by your accountant every spring.
Your accountant or tax software takes it from there to prepare and file the return. SeroBooks focuses on making the numbers right and correctly mapped, which is where most of the billable year-end hours are usually spent, and where a cleaner starting point can make the biggest difference to your accounting fees.
- Chart of accounts mapped to GIFI codes
- Balance sheet and income statement in GIFI order
- Adjusting entries recorded in the closing period
Fixed assets, close and locks
SeroBooks tracks fixed assets and calculates capital cost allowance by CCA class for Canadian businesses, and MACRS for US businesses. Depreciation posts to the ledger automatically, so the asset register and the balance sheet agree, and additions and disposals during the year are recorded where your accountant can see them rather than in a separate spreadsheet.
Year-end close rolls the year into retained earnings, and period locks stop anyone from editing a closed year by accident. On SeroBooks Pro, the append-only audit trail records every change, which matters if the CRA ever asks how a figure was reached. Records are retained for six years, in line with CRA record-keeping requirements.
Slips from the same ledger
Payroll in SeroBooks Pro, or SeroPayroll on its own, produces T4 and T4 Summary XML, T4A, and T5018 for construction businesses paying subcontractors, with filing readiness checks and a PIER review before the CRA runs its own. RL-1 slips are produced for Québec employees, as slips only, without electronic transmission to Revenu Québec.
Accountants and bookkeepers get free practice seats in SeroBooks, so they can review, post adjustments and close the year without asking you for a backup file or a set of exported reports. They work in the live books with the permissions you grant, and you can see exactly what they changed afterwards.
Frequently asked questions
Does SeroBooks file my T2 return?
SeroBooks maps your accounts to GIFI codes and produces the financial statements your T2 needs. The T2 itself is usually prepared and filed by your accountant or with dedicated tax software. SeroBooks focuses on getting the underlying numbers right and in GIFI form, which is most of the year-end work.
What is GIFI?
GIFI, the General Index of Financial Information, is the CRA’s set of standard codes for financial statement lines filed with a corporation’s T2 return. Mapping your chart of accounts to GIFI codes lets your statements be submitted in the format the CRA expects, without re-keying every line.
Does SeroBooks calculate CCA?
Yes. SeroBooks fixed assets calculate capital cost allowance by CCA class for Canadian businesses, and MACRS depreciation for US businesses, posting the entries to the ledger. Additions and disposals are tracked during the year, so your accountant can review the asset schedule directly.
Can my accountant close the year in SeroBooks?
Yes. Accountants get free practice seats in SeroBooks with the permissions you grant. They can post adjusting entries, run the year-end close and set period locks so closed years cannot be edited. There is no need to send backup files back and forth.
Which plan has the audit trail?
The append-only audit trail is part of SeroBooks Pro at $300 a month in USD, along with payroll for Canada and the US, demand forecasting and job costing. Period locks and year-end close help every SeroBooks customer protect closed periods from accidental changes.