The end of the financial year is the point at which you close the books, work out what the business actually earned, and produce the figures that everything else runs off: your tax return, your funding applications, and your own decisions about the year ahead.
For individuals and provisional taxpayers the year runs from 1 March to the end of February. A company’s financial year end is whatever was registered for it, commonly February but not necessarily. Confirm yours on your CIPC records before you plan around it, because every deadline that follows is calculated from that date.
You can choose your year end, and it is worth thinking about
A company’s financial year end is registered with the CIPC and does not have to be February. Most default to it because that is what the accountant suggested, but the date has practical consequences.
Pick a month that falls after your busiest trading period, not during it. A retailer closing its books in December is counting stock and reconciling accounts in the middle of its best month. A business whose year ends just after the rush has the cash, the figures and the time to do it properly.
Changing it is possible but not casual, since it requires a CIPC amendment and creates one odd-length period that complicates comparison. Worth getting right at registration, and worth reviewing once if the current date is actively working against you.
What closing the books actually involves
Five things, in this order.
Reconcile the bank. Every transaction in the accounts must match the bank statement. Unreconciled items are where errors hide, and an accountant will not sign off until this is done.
Chase and account for debtors. Work out who owes you and how old each amount is. Anything genuinely uncollectable should be written off deliberately rather than carried forward as an asset that does not exist.
Count the stock. A physical count on or near the year end date, not an estimate from the system. The difference between the two is information about theft, wastage or bad record keeping.
Account for what you owe. Supplier invoices received but not yet paid, accrued salaries, leave owing to staff. Leave these out and your profit is overstated, which feels good and then costs you in tax.
Deal with fixed assets. Record what was bought, write off what was scrapped, and apply depreciation.
Businesses that keep records current through the year do this in a few days. Businesses that do not spend weeks reconstructing a year from a shoebox, and pay their accountant to do the reconstructing.
What you get out of it
Three documents, and each answers a different question.
The income statement shows what the business earned and spent over the year, and therefore whether it made a profit. The balance sheet shows what it owns and owes at a single point in time, and therefore whether it is solvent. The cash flow statement shows where the money actually moved, which is frequently a different story from the profit figure.
That last distinction is the one that catches owners out. A profitable business with all its money tied up in unpaid invoices and unsold stock can still fail to make payroll. Profit is an opinion about a period. Cash is a fact on a date.
Use the numbers rather than filing them
Most small businesses produce annual financial statements for SARS and never look at them again. That is a wasted opportunity, because the year end is the only moment you have a complete picture.
Compare this year to last, line by line, and ask what moved. Did revenue grow while margin shrank, meaning you sold more and kept less? Which expense lines grew faster than revenue? What is your average debtor days, and is it getting worse?
Then set next year’s targets from what the numbers say rather than from optimism. Which measures are worth tracking through the year is covered in our guide to KPIs every business owner should track.
Why the statements matter beyond tax
Every funder, from a bank to an invoice financier to a development finance institution, asks for annual financial statements, usually the last two or three years. So do large customers running supplier vetting, and so do procurement departments.
Statements that are late, incomplete or inconsistent with your tax submissions cost you the opportunity, and that is a far larger number than any penalty. The businesses that get funded are usually the ones whose paperwork was already current when the opportunity appeared, not the ones who assembled it afterwards. What funders look at is covered in our guide to government funding.
The dates that follow from your year end
Once the books are closed, the filing calendar runs off that date. The company income tax return is due within twelve months of the financial year end. Provisional tax payments fall six months into the year and at the year end itself, with a voluntary top-up available afterwards. Payroll reconciliations run on the March to February cycle regardless of your company year end, and PAYE remains due monthly by the 7th throughout.
All of those are set out in our tax filing guide for small business owners. Filing season dates are announced by SARS annually, so confirm them each year rather than assuming they repeat.
Make next year easier
Reconcile monthly instead of annually. Keep business and personal money in separate accounts, because mixing them makes every expense claim harder to defend and every year end longer. File invoices and receipts as they arrive rather than hunting for them in February. Set tax money aside monthly in a separate account. And book your accountant early, because everyone with a February year end wants them at the same time.
Our bookkeeping checklist sets out the monthly routine that makes the annual one straightforward.
Frequently asked questions
When is the end of the financial year?
The end of February for individuals and provisional taxpayers. For a company it is whatever year end is on its CIPC records, commonly February but not always. Check before planning around it.
What is the difference between the financial year and the tax year?
For individuals they are the same period. For a company, the tax year follows the company’s own financial year end, which is why two businesses can have completely different deadlines.
Do I need an accountant to close the books?
Not legally in every case, but the annual financial statements are what funders, large customers and SARS rely on. Most owners find the cost is lower than the errors, and considerably lower if records were kept current.
What if my records are a mess?
Start reconstructing now rather than in February, and reconcile the bank first, because everything else is checked against it. Then put a monthly routine in place so it does not recur.
How long do I keep the records?
Five years. An assessment you cannot support with documents is one you will lose.
Where to start
Find your financial year end on your CIPC records and work backwards. Six weeks before it, reconcile the bank, chase your debtors and count the stock. Those three tasks are most of the work, and doing them before the date rather than after is the difference between a few days and a few weeks.
This article was updated in September 2026.
