Case study · Monthly bookkeeping

Closing the books by the 6th for a D2C skincare brand with three sales channels

Daily bank feeds and settlement reconciliation took an unreconciled gateway and marketplace difference from ₹3.8 lakh to under ₹15,000 in one quarter. Books have closed by the 6th for 20 months.

Monthly bookkeeping
Website and two marketplaces
COD

Client details and figures changed to protect confidentiality.

20 months
books closed by the 6th: ₹3.8 lakh
unreconciled at the start: under ₹15,000
after the first quarter: 8th
GST data with the CA

Context and challenge

The situation

The brand sells through its own website and two marketplaces. Orders run between 2,800 and 4,200 a month. Customers pay by card and UPI through a payment gateway, or by cash on delivery.

The founder had a part-time accountant who entered sales as monthly totals and bank receipts as they came. Nothing tied a payout in the bank to the orders it covered. The CA was getting data after the 20th and filing returns in a hurry.

When we looked, the gap between what the channels said they had paid and what had actually landed in the bank was about ₹3.8 lakh. Nobody could say which orders it belonged to.

There was one more worry. The brand was planning to raise outside money within a year, and the investors would ask for clean monthly financials. A set of books that closed three weeks late with an unexplained gap would not survive that conversation.

What to watch for

What made it tricky

A marketplace settlement is not one number. It is sales, less commission, less shipping, less returns, less GST on the fees, less TCS under GST, less TDS under section 194-O. A single payout in the bank covers hundreds of orders and several fee lines.
COD adds a delay. The courier remits after delivery, in batches, with its own charges deducted. Returns after dispatch mean a sale reversed and sometimes a courier charge still payable.
The founder also wanted margin by channel, which means fees and returns must be booked against the right channel, not into one expenses head.
Platform reports arrive in different formats and on different days. One marketplace settles weekly, the other every ten days, and the gateway settles daily. Reconciling means a routine that works across all three without special handling each month. We built the routine once and kept it identical, so that anyone on our team can pick it up.

How it ran

What we did

1
Connected bank feeds so that every bank line arrives daily, not on the 25th.
2
Set up the three channels and the COD courier as separate accounts, with a clearing account for each. Sales go in at order value; the payout clears it.
3
Built a settlement reconciliation routine. Each gateway or marketplace report is matched to the bank credit and split into sales, commission, shipping, GST on fees and TCS. Differences are listed order by order.
4
Worked through the old gap. Most of it was returns not reversed, one marketplace deduction booked twice and COD remittances never matched. The rest was written off with the founder and the CA agreeing on a note.
5
Booked purchase bills as they arrive, checked vendor GST, and prepared the monthly GST working for the CA: outward supplies by channel, input credit, TCS credit and the GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B data.
6
Issued a monthly MIS with sales, returns, fees and contribution margin by channel.
7
Set a calendar with the team: bank feeds checked daily, settlements matched every week, purchase bills booked as they arrive, books locked on the 6th, MIS on the 7th, GST data on the 8th.

Outcome

Results

Books closed by the 6th of every month for 20 straight months.
The unreconciled settlement difference fell from ₹3.8 lakh to under ₹15,000 in the first quarter, and stays small because it is checked every week.
GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B data reaches the CA by the 8th, which leaves time to review instead of rush.
The founder sees contribution margin per channel every month, and has changed ad spend between channels on the strength of it.

Operational impact

Before

Sales entered as monthly totals.
About ₹3.8 lakh unreconciled between channel payouts and the bank.
The CA received data after the 20th.

After

Books closed by the 6th for 20 straight months.
Unreconciled difference under ₹15,000 in the first quarter.
GST data reaches the CA by the 8th.

What the CA or owner gets now

The CA receives a closed set of books, a reconciliation schedule for each channel and the GST working, on the same day each month.
The CA can log in and trace any figure to an order or a bank line. They stay in charge of filing and sign-off.
Settlement reconciliation is documented, so the CA can see how a payout was split, and a new person at the CA's end can follow it without a call.

More reading: Switching accounting software in the middle of the financial year

Client details and figures changed to protect confidentiality.

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