Benefits: Whatever kind of business you run, you have to close your books at least once a year to prepare an income tax return — or more frequently, if you want to get a better handle on how your business is doing. An important part of closing your books is preparing a trial balance — in other words, a list of all of your bookkeeping accounts and the balance of each at the end of the period — to see if your books are still in balance. If you are already doing this, you know that it is tedious and time-consuming; if your accountant is doing it, you know that it is an added expense.

The trial balance spreadsheet contained in the attached file is designed to save you time and money in preparing the trial balance yourself. The spreadsheet contains over 80 common account titles in a trial balance format. Simply plug in your balance for each account and the spreadsheet will automatically add up the debits and credits, and tell you if your books are out of balance (and by how much). Since it is a spreadsheet template, you can add or delete accounts or otherwise modify it to suit your needs and preferences.

File Description: The file contains a Microsoft Excel (version 4.0 and above) spreadsheet template.

Special Features:

• Download this spreadsheet template just once, and be able to use it over and over again.
• The trial balance spreadsheet is comprehensive — more than 80 items that need to be considered when reconciling your bank statement are already listed.
• Customize the spreadsheet to suit your needs, adding or deleting accounts.
• The spreadsheet is easy to use. Just plug in your numbers and the spreadsheet will automatically add up the debits and credits, and tell you if your books are out of balance (and by how much).

Download: Trial balance spreadsheet