Create a Consolidated Company

The Consolidation wizard walks you through the process of creating a consolidated company in a few simple steps. When you run the wizard, a chart of accounts for the consolidated parent is created; it is based on the parent company’s chart of accounts. To ensure accurate reporting, the Consolidate Company wizard helps you to match subsidiary company accounts to the consolidated parent’s chart of accounts.

Before you create a consolidated company, perform the following tasks

Make sure that all of the companies to be consolidated have been upgraded to the same version of Sage 50 Accounting.
Identify the parent company.
Identify one or more subsidiary companies.
Ensure that each company has a unique company name and file name, and each company operates in the same fiscal year.

Note: The rule for the same fiscal year would also apply for any company with transactions in the previous, current, and next fiscal years. (Sage 50 Premium Accounting)

Ensure that the parent company is in single-user mode, and the subsidiary companies are closed.
Prepare the accounts for account mapping:
Each subsidiary company’s accounts should be mapped to the parent company’s accounts. If any account numbers differ, the Consolidation wizard automatically maps accounts according to these conditions:
If the subsidiary company has fewer digits in its asset account numbers than the consolidated parent, then Sage 50 Accounting adds additional zeroes to the end of each subsidiary company’s asset accounts.

For example, if the parent asset account is 168000, then the subsidiary asset account 1680 becomes 168000.

If the subsidiary company has more digits in its asset account numbers than the consolidated parent, then Sage 50 Accounting truncates each subsidiary asset account number to match the length of the consolidated parent company’s asset account.

For example, if the parent asset account is 1680, then the subsidiary asset account 1680911 becomes 1680.

If a subsidiary company account cannot be matched, you must map account numbers manually (you can do this quickly and easily while running the Consolidate Company wizard).

Note: During account mapping, you cannot view departments.

To create a consolidated company:

Open a subsidiary or parent company. If you use security, enter the password for the sysadmin user.

Note: Users authorized to access the parent company can access the consolidated parent company.

In the Home window on the File menu, click Consolidate Company.
Click Next to start the wizard. Identify whether the current company is the parent company or a subsidiary company.
Enter a consolidated company filename. The wizard will create a new data file (.csi) for the consolidated company. Click Next to continue.
Click Add to identify one or more subsidiary companies, then click Next to continue.

On the Related Accounts page, the Consolidate Company wizard automatically maps account numbers from the parent company to each subsidiary company (according to the conditions described above in the section “Before You Start”). If no checkmark appears beside a company name in the Related Accounts column, one or more accounts need to be mapped.

Select the company and then click Relate to manually map accounts.

Note: To ensure accurate financial reporting, you should map all subsidiary accounts to a consolidated parent account; however, the Consolidate Company wizard lets you consolidate a company even if some accounts are not mapped. You will be reminded to map outstanding accounts when you try to generate a report.

Choose to show all unmapped accounts. Beside each unmapped subsidiary account, click the Find button in the Consolidated Parent Accounts column to identify a parent account to map to.
Click OK when you have matched all accounts.
Repeat steps 6 through 8 for each subsidiary company that requires account mapping.
Click Next and then finish the wizard. The Consolidate Company wizard retrieves opening balances and transactions for the current fiscal year from the subsidiary companies into the consolidated parent company.

It identifies opening balances and adds them to the consolidated parent company, and retrieves all transactions for the current year, up to the latest transaction date.

How often should I consolidate?

You should update your consolidated company as part of your year-end procedures. However, if you prefer to keep your records more current, you can update your consolidated company more often.