How to shorten the month-end close.
APQC’s benchmark across 10,201 organizations puts the median close at six calendar days and the slowest at ten. Ledge’s 2025 survey found half of finance teams take six or more business days, 94% close in Excel, and cash reconciliation alone takes 20 to 50 hours a month. What separates a five-day close from a ten-day one is where the hours go.
The benchmark.
APQC measures the close in calendar days from running the trial balance to completing consolidated statements, weekends included. Top performers take 5, the median 6, the bottom 10. APQC names three drivers of the difference: a central chart of accounts and reporting process, integrated systems, and trained people with the time to do the work. Its own note on the slowest closes: they wait on other departments.
Ledge’s survey counts business days across 100 mostly mid-market teams. Half take six or more, 18% close in three or fewer. The blockers named: dependencies on other departments 56%, Excel 50%, legacy systems 40%, transaction complexity 39%, understaffing 37%.
Where the hours go.
In most closes we see, the hours go to three places. Reconciliations, especially cash and card, where staff spend hours matching lines that already match. Recurring entries, accruals, prepaids, depreciation, deferred revenue, rebuilt each month from last month’s schedule. And waiting: for the last invoices, the timesheets, the intercompany balance from the other entity.
The first two are accounting work. The third is chasing, and the chasing sets the calendar.
A close, day by day.
Day minus one
Review prepaids, deferred expenses, recurring accruals, reversing entries, suspense and clearing accounts. Confirm with AR, AP, inventory and payroll what is still open. Do everything you can before month end.
Day zero
Operations confirms what shipped and what was received. Invoicing completes billings. AR posts deposits. AP enters vendor bills and card transactions. Payroll accrues.
Days one and two
Reconcile the subledgers, intercompany, bank, card and loans. Close AR and AP. Record fixed assets and depreciation, reconcile deferred revenue.
Days three to six
Consolidating and elimination entries, variance analysis, trial balance review, the pack. A person owns this part. If it starts on day three, the close finishes on day five or six. If the reconciliations are still open on day four, it finishes on day ten.
What to automate first.
- The chasing. An agent that asks for the missing invoices, timesheets and intercompany balances on day minus one, and again on day zero, shortens the calendar more than any faster reconciliation.
- Matching. Pull the bank and card feeds, match what matches, and hand a person only the differences, each with a proposed explanation. The 20 to 50 hours go here.
- Recurring entries. Draft accruals, prepaids, depreciation and deferred revenue from last month’s schedule and this month’s new invoices. A person approves the batch.
- The pack. Automate it last. The numbers have to be right before a faster report helps.
Ledge found most teams automate less than 40% of the close. The first two items above are most of the remaining 60%. The month-end close cost calculator prices the hours for your own task count and wages.
On Excel.
94% of teams close in Excel and half say it is why the close is slow. The slow part is the copy-paste between the system and the spreadsheet, which someone does by hand each month. An agent that reads the system and writes the workbook, or skips the workbook, removes the step without removing the tool people trust. How the agent works in your accounting system.
Sources.
- Cycle time to complete monthly consolidated financial statements. APQC, Open Standards Benchmarking, 2026. Calendar days from the trial balance to the consolidated statements: top performers 5, median 6, bottom performers 10, across 10,201 participating organizations. Source
- Month-end close benchmarks for 2025. Ledge, 2025. Survey of 100 finance professionals by a close-automation vendor: 50% take six or more business days to close, 18% close in three or fewer; cash reconciliation alone takes 20 to 50 hours a month; 94% use Excel in the close. Source
- Office of Finance benchmark, close duration. Ventana Research, via Numeric, 2022. 59% of respondents closed within six business days; 48 companies, 70% with over 1,000 employees, so a thin and large-company sample. Source
- Accountants and auditors, median pay. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2025. Median pay $40.23 an hour, $83,680 a year, May 2025. Before benefits and overhead. Source
- Bookkeeping, accounting and auditing clerks, median pay. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2025. Median pay $24.36 an hour, $50,670 a year, May 2025. Before benefits and overhead. Source
Questions.
- What is a realistic target?
- APQC’s top performers close in five calendar days; a private company with a small team is doing well at five to seven. Three business days is possible and uncommon: 18% of teams in Ledge’s survey. Set the target from where your hours go.
- Should we close faster if it means less accuracy?
- No, and APQC says the same. Ask the team how much time they need and what causes the delays before shortening anything. A fast close on incomplete numbers costs more than a slow one.
- Does this need a new accounting system?
- Usually not. An agent can take over the waiting and the matching in the system you have, with or without an API.
Take the chasing out of your close.
Send your close checklist and tell us your accounting system, and we’ll mark the tasks an agent should take first. Fixed price per automation. If the first one misses the scope we agreed, you don’t pay.
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