How to prepare the assets for the year-end closing

What is it for?

Before closing the fiscal year, tangible fixed assets must have their depreciation posted. The Closing alerts of the assets window reads the assets and tells you, one by one, what is left to do: assets still In preparation, depreciation planned but not processed (including that of a Stopped asset), accounting quotas below the tax minimum and assets whose tax life ends before the accounting life. It only reads: it changes no asset and posts nothing.

When to use it?

• Before closing the fiscal year, and again after processing depreciation, to confirm that nothing is left.
• After changing an asset's useful life, to see whether the tax life is now shorter than the accounting life.
• Do not use it as the list of missing entries for the whole closing: it only covers fixed assets. The full closing is in the year-end closing panel.

Where to find it?

Accounting › Close › Close the month, in Supporting lists, Closing alerts of the assets. The Accountant, the Fiscal officer and the Auditor have it. Management does not.

The Fiscal officer also sees a summary in Accounting › Close › Year-end closing panel (see below). The VAT Regularisations of the assets are in the same supporting lists.

Before you start

• Your profile is Accountant (tested with it up to the last step).
• There are fixed assets registered and the year's depreciation is (or should be) processed (process the month's depreciation).
• The example is fiscal year 2026 of Empresa Demonstração, Lda, on 03/11/2026: the October and November instalments have not yet been posted.

How to use it

1. Open Accounting › Close › Close the month and, in Supporting lists, Closing alerts of the assets. The window shows Year from (01/01/2026), Year to (31/12/2026) and In preparation: alert after (months) (6, the company's starting value).
2. Click Check. The Alert, Asset and What to do list shows one line per finding. In the example there are 6 lines, because each asset in use has periods of the year not processed:
   • Depreciation not processed: “3 depreciation period(s) of the year are planned but not processed (first: 31/10/2026). Process them before closing.” (Impressora multifunções and Telemóveis da equipa comercial). The other assets have 1 period (31/12/2026), which can only be processed in December.
3. In preparation for too long. The Servidor de cópias de segurança has been In preparation since its acquisition on 01/10/2026. With the 6-month limit, year 2026 does not flag it (only 3 months have passed). If you lower In preparation: alert after (months) to 1 and click Check again, this appears: “In preparation since the acquisition on 01/10/2026 (more than 1 mês at the end of the year): it has not depreciated. Put it into use, or cancel it if the purchase did not go ahead.” An asset in preparation does not depreciate: register it and put it into use or cancel it.
4. Resolve the Depreciation not processed alerts: process depreciation up to the end of the year in Monthly depreciation and click Check again. The December period can only be processed in December; the alert stays until then.
5. Quota below the tax minimum. For the example, the accounting useful life of the Mobiliário de escritório was changed to 40 years (change the useful life), and after the board is recalculated this appears: “The accounting quota is below the minimum tax quota: 256,41 € of depreciation is lost for tax purposes in the year (DR 25/2009, art. 18.º). Review the quota or accept the loss.” The amount is the year's Lost depreciation: the part of the depreciation that, under the “use it or lose it” rule, will never again be accepted as an expense. Review the useful life, or accept the loss knowing that it is final. (The useful life was put back to 8 years after the example.)
6. Tax life shorter than the accounting life. The same path warns you when tax depreciation ends before the accounting board. With the useful life of the Impressora multifunções at 6 years and tax depreciation ending earlier, and the year 2028 in Year from/Year to: “The tax depreciation ends on 28/02/2029 but the accounting board runs until 31/01/2032: 1.137,50 € of accounting depreciation will be booked after the tax life, with no tax counterpart. Review the useful life (Simulate a change on the asset first) or accept the difference.” The alert appears when the end of the tax life falls within 12 months of the end of the year (the limit is a company setting). Year 2026 does not show it.
7. Stopped asset. A Stopped asset with instalments of the year not processed also appears, with a different sentence: “Stopped asset: confirm that the depreciation should be suspended. 3 depreciation period(s) of the year are planned but not processed (first: 31/10/2026). If it must go on, resume the asset and process them before closing.” (stop, resume or change the useful life). By default, the monthly batch leaves it out.
8. When you have finished, Export to spreadsheet saves the file alertas_fecho_2026-12-31.xlsx and Print generates the PDF Alertas de fecho dos ativos.pdf, with the company, the tax number (NIF), the period and the issue date, and the Alert, Asset, What to do table. Use them to keep a record of the closing status.

Fiscal officer: the closing panel

In the Year-end closing panel, the Fiscal officer clicks See details in the Year-end adjustments step and sees the same alerts for depreciation not processed (for example, “Depreciation: Impressora multifunções - 3 depreciation period(s) of the year are planned but not processed…”), together with those for deferrals and inventory. The Fixed assets are ready for the year-end check stays yellow until the depreciation is processed.

Asset VAT regularisations

The VAT Regularisations list (Close the month, in Supporting lists) shows, for each asset sold or scrapped within the regularisation period, the VAT Deducted, To Pay to the State and To Deduct (in favour of the taxpayer), and the proposed draft journal entry. Lines only exist after you Dispose of / Scrap an asset (scrap or sell an asset); in the demonstration the list is empty and says: “The VAT regularisations of the assets appear here, one for each asset sold or written off within the regularisation period; they are created by the disposal of the asset.” Pending validation by a certified accountant: the regularisation period and the calculation of the VAT to pay or deduct (VAT Code (CIVA), art. 24).

Expected result

• Before closing, Check returns only alerts you have knowingly accepted (for example, a known tax loss) or none.
• The window and the exports create no journal entries: they only read.
• The Fiscal officer sees the asset closing step with no alerts for depreciation not processed.

Important notes

• It only covers fixed assets. It does not see assets without a depreciation board or anything outside the chosen year: change Year from and Year to for another fiscal year.
• The window only warns. It saves nothing and blocks nothing; the decision to close with an alert is yours. In the closing panel, the asset check stays yellow (warning), not red.
• The tax loss is final. A quota below the tax minimum is lost; it is not recovered in later years. Pending validation by a certified accountant: the minimum depreciation rule and its finality (DR 25/2009, art. 18).

Common problems

I do not see “Closing alerts of the assets” in the Close menu

• Cause: it is not an entry of the Close menu: it is in the Supporting lists of Close the month. Management does not have it.
• What to do: open Close the month and look in Supporting lists, or ask the Accountant.

The depreciation not processed alert does not go away

• Cause: the next period (31/12/2026) cannot be processed yet, because it is only posted at the end of the month.
• What to do: process the overdue depreciation and wait for December; the alert for the last period stays until then.

“Nothing to review: the assets are ready for the closing.”

• Cause: the chosen year has no assets with periods not processed, assets in preparation for too long, quotas below the minimum or a short tax life (in the example, 2025).
• What to do: nothing. Check that Year from and Year to are those of the fiscal year you are closing.