Reconcil
Alignment and reconciliation of physical assets
inventory and accounting records
Reconcil is a software program that makes it possible to reconcile two sets of records by comparing them and making sure that they match each other.
The two sets of records can be: on the one hand, the fixed assets physical inventory records from Inventif and, on the other hand, the accountancy fixed assets records.
Reconcil helps identify possible discrepancies and handle the possible mismatches between the two sets. Some level of exception is to be expected but they don't have to happen too often and have to be explained. If not, investigation will have to be conducted in order to make the necessary adjustments. Indeed, there might be timing differences between the two sets of records, missing records, incorrectly keyed information, etc. At each step, a decision will have to be made to decide whether the alignment is accurate or if it requires further revision.
This number can be the fixed asset accounting number which is present not only in accounting but also in the physical inventory of fixed assets. Thus, Reconcil makes it possible to align and reconcile fixed assets inventory data and accounting data.
Reconcil takes, as an input, two text files which are lists of records, for example in CSV format. For each record in a list, Reconcil associates zero, one or more records from the second list and vice versa, based on the key common to both lists.
After configuring the two files and various criteria, an alignment is made upon opening of the dataset.
Automatic reconciliation, which can be requested immediately, solves all or part of the reconciliation problem.
The alignment can result in having one record from one list aligned with exactly one record of the second list. But it can also result in having n records from the first list aligned with m records of the second list (with n different from m). Aligned records share the same key. They form groups of records.
For example, this makes it possible to compare an accounting record representing several assets with one or more physical inventory records.
Alignment can be improved using secondary criteria and manually by permutations or alignment breaks.
Then, one can examine the remaining records to understand why matching records were not found in the second list.
As you resolve cases of misalignment, you can manually set the status of records:
- lone, a record in one list has no correspondent in the other list,
- not examined, a record in a list has not yet been examined,
- ignored, a record in a list has been examined and is deliberately ignored,
- problematic, a record in a list is the subject of a questioning requiring an investigation,
- partly reconciled, a record from one list belongs to a group of records of which only a subset has been reconciled with records from the other list,
- strictly reconciled, a record in one list belongs to a group of records which have all been reconciled with all the records in the other list.
- the alignment view is used to view records from a list with their corresponding records in the other list, but also lone records and records which are not lone but which have no correspondent in the other list,
- the intersection view of the two lists is the set of all records in a list which have a correspondent in the other list,
- views which show records present in one list but not in the other,
- aggregates view or aggregated data for each of the two lists present, for example, for each key, the number of records of a list having this key, sums of values…
- the synthesis view combines alignment and aggregation: for each key, for example, it reports the number of records in the first list and the number of records in the second list. The user can also aggregate other numeric fields.
Reconcil helps identify possible discrepancies and handle the possible mismatches between the two sets. Some level of exception is to be expected but they don't have to happen too often and have to be explained. If not, investigation will have to be conducted in order to make the necessary adjustments. Indeed, there might be timing differences between the two sets of records, missing records, incorrectly keyed information, etc. At each step, a decision will have to be made to decide whether the alignment is accurate or if it requires further revision.
Explanations
Reconcil is a software which makes it possible to align and then to reconcile two lists of records sharing a key, i.e. having information in common, for example a number.
This number can be the fixed asset accounting number which is present not only in accounting but also in the physical inventory of fixed assets. Thus, Reconcil makes it possible to align and reconcile fixed assets inventory data and accounting data.
Reconcil takes, as an input, two text files which are lists of records, for example in CSV format. For each record in a list, Reconcil associates zero, one or more records from the second list and vice versa, based on the key common to both lists.
After configuring the two files and various criteria, an alignment is made upon opening of the dataset.
Automatic reconciliation, which can be requested immediately, solves all or part of the reconciliation problem.
The alignment can result in having one record from one list aligned with exactly one record of the second list. But it can also result in having n records from the first list aligned with m records of the second list (with n different from m). Aligned records share the same key. They form groups of records.
For example, this makes it possible to compare an accounting record representing several assets with one or more physical inventory records.
Alignment can be improved using secondary criteria and manually by permutations or alignment breaks.
Reviewing data and progressive issue resolution
Filters make it possible to hide the reconciled records or the ones we wish to ignore.
Then, one can examine the remaining records to understand why matching records were not found in the second list.
As you resolve cases of misalignment, you can manually set the status of records:
- lone, a record in one list has no correspondent in the other list,
- not examined, a record in a list has not yet been examined,
- ignored, a record in a list has been examined and is deliberately ignored,
- problematic, a record in a list is the subject of a questioning requiring an investigation,
- partly reconciled, a record from one list belongs to a group of records of which only a subset has been reconciled with records from the other list,
- strictly reconciled, a record in one list belongs to a group of records which have all been reconciled with all the records in the other list.
Data visualization
The data can be viewed in various views:
- the alignment view is used to view records from a list with their corresponding records in the other list, but also lone records and records which are not lone but which have no correspondent in the other list,
- the intersection view of the two lists is the set of all records in a list which have a correspondent in the other list,
- views which show records present in one list but not in the other,
- aggregates view or aggregated data for each of the two lists present, for example, for each key, the number of records of a list having this key, sums of values…
- the synthesis view combines alignment and aggregation: for each key, for example, it reports the number of records in the first list and the number of records in the second list. The user can also aggregate other numeric fields.
Export of results
The reconciliation results can be exported in XML format, visible in an Excel or Libre Office spreadsheet.