If you run a business with more than one location, or you simply need to open next year's books on time, you will use two screens in Manage again and again. This guide covers financial years and branches in Manage: how to add a branch, which one is your Head Office, and how the next and the prior financial year are created.
Manage is the admin portal for your Aicountly account. It holds the company itself, its branches, its business IDs and its financial years, so that apps such as Smart Books, Inventory and Billing work on the same set-up. This article describes what the Manage screens do today; the steps below are general guidance, so confirm accounting-specific choices with your CA.
Where to find financial years and branches in Manage
Pick your company in Manage and you will find two entries for it: Branches (the page opens at /branch) and Financial Years (at /fy). Both pages show the name of the company you are working on in the page header. If you have several companies, search by name or by company ID and open the one you need.
One rule applies to both pages. Only the person who created the company can add or change things here. If a company has been shared with you, you can view its financial years, but Manage tells you that only the creator can add new ones.
Add a branch: what Manage asks for
Choose Add Branch on the Branches page. The form is split into two cards.
- General Info: Name (required), Alias, Opening Date, a Closed On checkbox and a Head Office (HO) checkbox.
- Address: Address Line 1 and 2, City, Pin Code, State and Country. City, Pin Code and State are required, and the Zone (also required) sits in the form as well.
If the branch sits at the company's registered address, Manage lets you pick up the registered office address instead of typing it again. That saves time and avoids two slightly different spellings of the same address across your records.
Use a clear, unique name. Branch names show up wherever a branch has to be chosen later, so "Pune warehouse" is more useful than "Branch 2".
Head Office: only one branch can hold it
Every company can have exactly one Head Office. Tick the HO box while saving a branch, or use Mark as Head Office on the branch list. Manage asks you to confirm, and it tells you which branch stops being the Head Office. The Head Office carries an HO badge in the list.
Two safeguards are worth knowing:
- You cannot delete the Head Office branch. Mark another branch as Head Office first.
- You cannot untick HO on the current Head Office branch while editing it, for the same reason. Move the status to another branch instead.
Before you delete or close a branch
Deleting a branch removes it from the company in Manage. The confirmation message is blunt about the consequences: Manage cannot check whether the branch is in use, and vouchers, stock or bills held in Smart Books, Inventory or Billing are not deleted. They simply no longer have a branch to open under and may stop appearing in reports. It cannot be undone.
So the safe habit is simple. Delete a branch only if you added it by mistake and never used it. If a location has actually shut down, edit the branch and tick Closed On instead.
Financial years in Manage: how the list works
The Financial Years page lists every year for the company, newest first, with the year name, the period, the default valuation method and a status column. A year that was brought in from older data carries an Imported badge.
Years follow the Indian pattern of 1 April to 31 March. A year is shown as, for example, 2026–27, which runs from 1 April 2026 to 31 March 2027.
Add the next financial year
Choose Add FY. Manage proposes the year that comes immediately after your latest one, and the start and end dates are filled in for you and locked, so you cannot create a year with a gap or an overlap. What you do choose is the Default Valuation Method: AVG COST, FIFO or LIFO. The form starts with the method used in your latest year, which keeps your stock valuation consistent unless you deliberately change it.
There is also a timing rule. The next year can be created only from 1 January of the calendar year in which it starts. For 2027–28, which starts on 1 April 2027, the option opens on 1 January 2027. Before that date the button is disabled and Manage shows the date it will open. If the year already exists, you are told that too.
Add a prior financial year for older data
When you are moving from another system, you may need an earlier year to hold history. Add prior FY creates the year immediately before your earliest one, one year at a time. Manage warns that this is meant for historical migration only: add the prior year, then import the data in Smart Books under that year. When you are ready, use the Year End carry forward so that the next year's opening balances line up.
Prior years have no calendar date gate, but they need at least one existing financial year, and only the company owner can add them.
A short set-up routine
- Create the company and review its registered address.
- Add every operating location as a branch, with a unique name and its zone, city, Pin Code and state.
- Mark the correct branch as Head Office.
- Check the current financial year and its valuation method before anyone starts posting entries.
- In early January, add the next year so that it is ready well before 1 April.
- If you are migrating, add prior years one at a time and import data for each before moving on.
Key takeaways
- Only the company creator can add branches or financial years; shared users can view.
- One Head Office per company; you move the status, you do not remove it.
- Delete a branch only if it was never used; otherwise mark it as Closed On.
- The next financial year opens for creation on 1 January of the year it starts; its dates are fixed for you.
- Prior years are for migration, added one at a time, followed by a data import and a year-end carry forward.
Getting these two screens right early keeps the rest of your books tidy, because every voucher, stock movement and invoice lands under a branch and a year. You can read more about the Manage app on its product page, and the same discipline helps in year-end work such as the physical stock verification routine and the bookkeeping checklist for Indian SMEs.
