A Holding With Several Companies: Multi-Entity Accounting in Zoho Books
Group owners rarely struggle to see one company's numbers. What is hard is seeing the whole group's position on the same date.
The root cause
Each entity uses its own chart of accounts, customer names are written differently, and intercompany transactions are recorded on one side only. The combined report then has to be assembled by hand in a spreadsheet every month, and is always late.
Four decisions up front
- One master chart of accounts. Every entity uses the same structure, with extra accounts only where needed. Without this, consolidation stays manual.
- Consistent entity codes on customers, suppliers and projects.
- Intercompany rules. Who issues the invoice, which accounts are used, and how balances are reconciled each month.
- Currency. Decide the group reporting currency and how rates are recorded.
How it works in Zoho Books
Zoho Books keeps a separate organisation per legal entity, so each set of books stands on its own. For combined reporting, data from all organisations is brought together in Zoho Analytics and presented as a group dashboard. Feature coverage varies by edition, so test your reporting needs early.
Commonly missed
- A shared close schedule for all entities. Without it, the group report always waits for the slowest entity.
- Access rights. A director of one company may not be allowed to see another's numbers.
- Elimination of intercompany transactions in the combined report.
Start from the board's questions
Write the five questions you want answered every month, such as profit by entity, combined cash and receivables by age. Design the data structure from those questions, not the other way round. See our implementation service.