Cash closing: what it is, how to do it and its importance
Cash closing is an essential routine in businesses, regardless of size or segment — because it allows errors or frauds that lead to losses to be identified. In an ideal world, closing should be carried out at the end of each working day or shift, as this facilitates financial control. And in fact, this process can be quite quick and simple once you learn how to do it. Cash can be considered the heart of a company: it is not the only thing that matters, but if there is a serious error in it, this will probably be fatal to the company’s health . After all, it is through the cash register that all the financial resources for sales and all the money the company needs to pay its employees, inputs, bills — in addition, of course, to the profit. Every business needs money and profit, right.
What is cash closing?
However, often, the lack of control over this money can cause losses that are inexplicable : why do we sell so much and still not manage to make a profit? There are several possibilities to explain this phenomenon. But, to understand what happens — and be able to take action to resolve it — it is essential to have control over your cash. And this is where we observe the importance of cash closing , the main subject of this article. What is cash closing? Anyone who has never performed a cash closing and hears about it this way — especially when we talk about the importance of this procedure — may think that it is something very complicated to do. Something that only experts can do, with a lot of effort. But the truth is that it is a simple and routine procedure.
5 steps to close the cash register, in practice
Which doesn’t diminish its importance, nor allow you to pay less attention to it, of course. In short, cash closing consists of counting and checking all cash inflows and outflows in a given period . The idea is to check whether the sales that were recorded were actually paid, whether all the money is where it should be — or whether there is something wrong. Various errors can occur, such as giving too much change, entering a different amount on the card machine — more or less. Ideally, the values you find in the cash register at the end of the day are exactly the same as expected , according to the transactions recorded on the day. Otherwise, we have a “cash break”. Breakage can happen due to one of these errors, but also due to theft or fraud. Making indiscriminate cash withdrawals — especially to cover the owners’ personal expenses — is not something that should happen.