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Built-in finance reports

Built-in finance reports in Business Central: one page per standard or Excel report, covering general ledger, trial balance, receivables, payables, VAT, consolidation, deferrals, cost accounting and fixed assets. Answers questions about what a report shows, its filters and options, and when to use it.

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Path: Business functionality > Finance > Financial analytics > Built-in finance reports · tier official · system finance · narrative reviewed (checked by Opus)

Overview

This section documents the standard reports that ship with Business Central finance. Most pages describe a single report: what it displays, the main request-page options such as date ranges, dimension filters and currency choices, and the tasks it supports, such as reconciliation, audit, period close or tax filing. Both classic reports and Excel reports are included, and some topics exist in both forms, for example Trial Balance and Aged Accounts Payables.

The reports fall into groups. Core ledger reports include Trial Balance and its variants, Detail Trial Balance, Balance Sheet, Income Statement, G/L Register and Audit Trail. Receivables and payables reports cover aging, customer and vendor balances, statements, order reports and top 10 lists. VAT reports cover registers, reconciliation, settlement and VIES declarations. The other groups are consolidation, deferral summaries and cost accounting.

Start with “Built-in finance reports in Business Central”. It gives the overview and the report explorer, and it groups reports by area. The analytics pages for accounts payable and accounts receivable point to Power BI and Data Analysis as alternatives. Then open the page for the report you need.

Key points

  • The overview page groups reports into core finance, deferral, VAT, consolidation, cost accounting, and receivables and payables, and mentions a report explorer.
  • Trial balance family: Trial Balance, Trial Balance by Period (12 periods), Trial Balance/Budget, Closing Trial Balance and Detail Trial Balance, with Excel versions for some.
  • Aging reports: Aged Accounts Payable and Aged Accounts Receivables, with Excel versions that use Aged as of and Period length parameters and local and foreign currency worksheets.
  • Vendor - Summary Aging is a legacy report; the page recommends the Aged Accounts Payable report instead.
  • VAT reports include VAT Statement, VAT Register, VAT Exceptions, VAT Reconciliation, G/L - VAT Reconciliation, Calculate and Post Tax Settlement, VAT Registration No. Check (EU VIES) and the VIES declaration.
  • Consolidation reports include Consolidated Trial Balance (standard, 4-column and Excel), G/L Consolidation Eliminations and Intercompany Transactions.
  • Cost accounting reports compare actual and budgeted costs and cover journals, allocations, cost types and statements by period.
  • Customer and vendor reports include balance to date, trial balance, order detail and summary, top 10 lists, Customer Statement and the Reminder report. Financial statements (Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Cash Flow, Retained Earnings) filter by date range.

Learn pages

  • Accounts payables analytics: See which analytics options are available in Business Central so that you can keep track of your accounts payable.
  • Accounts receivable analytics: Explore the reports and analytics in the standard version of Business Central that can help you track your accounts receivable.
  • Aged Accounts Payable (report): Analyze vendor balances at the end of each period. Use this report to monitor unpaid invoices and prioritize payments for overdue accounts.
  • Aged Accounts Payables (Excel report): Analyze vendor balances at the end of each period. Helps ensure the reliability of what you owe your vendors.
  • Aged Accounts Receivable (Excel report): Analyze customer balances at the end of each period. Used as a gauge to measure the reliability of collectable debts for your customers.
  • Aged Accounts Receivables (report): Legacy report for analyzing customer balances at the end of each period. Used as a gauge to measure the reliability of collectable debts for your customers.
  • Audit Trail (report): Review the audit trail of G/L registers and entries, including creation dates, user IDs, reversed entries, and transaction details for auditing and compliance.
  • Balance Comp. - Prev. Year (report): Compare account balances side-by-side across two fiscal years and identify trends and variances. Use this report to analyze year-over-year financial performance and support strategic decision-making.
  • Balance Sheet (report): Get an overview of your financials across assets, liabilities, and equity.
  • Built-in finance reports in Business Central: Explore the built-in financial reports in the standard version of Business Central.
  • Calculate and Post Tax Settlement (report): Used at the end of a VAT period to calculate and post the amount payable or receivable for tax filing. Calculates VAT based on posted entries and creates a journal to record the VAT settlement. Typically run monthly or quarterly depending on filing frequency.
  • Chart of Accounts (report): Review and manage your company’s general ledger structure by listing all G/L accounts with their types, balances, and categories.
  • Check Value Posting (report): Verify whether value entries, such as inventory or cost postings, are correctly posted to the general ledger. Use this report to validate document posting behavior during implementation or troubleshooting.
  • Closing Trial Balance (report): Check end of financial year figures, excluding closing entries, and compare this year and the previous year.
  • Consolidated Trial Balance (4) (report): Get a combined overview of general ledger entries for two or more companies in one consolidated company. This version of the report lets you display up to four business units as columns. Use this report to analyze consolidated financial data from multiple companies.
  • Consolidated Trial Balance (Excel report): Use Excel to view a snapshot of your consolidated chart of accounts at a given point to check the debit and credit net change and closing balance.
  • Consolidated Trial Balance (report): Combines financial data across companies, allowing finance teams to analyze consolidated performance and ensure alignment across entities.
  • Cost Acctg. Analysis (report): Presents a comparison of actual versus expected cost values. Choose the appropriate period and budget version before running. Highlights deviations between budgeted and actual cost performance to inform better forecasting.
  • Cost Acctg. Balance/Budget (report): Use this report to analyze balances for cost accounts and budgets to support financial planning and control.
  • Cost Acctg. Journal (report): Run this report to review posted cost entries and ensure transactions were properly recorded in cost journals.
  • Cost Acctg. Statement (report): Summarizes all cost entries across selected dimensions such as departments or cost centers. Use filters for period, cost type, or cost object to refine the view and support operational analysis.
  • Cost Acctg. Statement/Budget (report): Compares cost statements to budgeted amounts by cost center, showing variance by amount and percentage. Use this report to identify gaps between projected and actual costs and improve budgeting effectiveness.
  • Cost Acctg. Stmt. per Period (report): Analyze cost activity within specific periods, such as monthly or quarterly intervals. The report shows actual cost entries grouped by reporting periods. Use date filters and cost dimensions to view targeted results.
  • Cost Allocations (report): Displays how costs were split or assigned based on allocation rules. Use with cost centers or allocation bases. Explains cost distribution across entities using set allocation methods, ideal for cost control.
  • Cost Types Details (report): Displays cost breakdowns by cost type, such as labor, materials, and overhead. Customize filters by period or cost center.
  • Customer - Balance to date (report): Get a detailed balance for selected customers at the close of an accounting period or fiscal year, for example.
  • Customer - Detail Trial Balance (report): Check whether all entries for a specific customer are accounted for, or for other internal checks on customer ledgers.
  • Customer - Order Detail (report): Analyze outstanding sales orders to understand your expected sales volume grouped by customer. To highlight overdue back orders, compare overall outstanding shipments with the planned shipment dates.
  • Customer - Order Summary (report): See outstanding sales order amounts by customer, grouped into 30-day shipment periods, to gauge expected sales volume.
  • Customer - Payment Receipt (report): View payment receipts for each customer ledger entry of the type Payment.
  • Customer - Top 10 list (report): Review customers with the most transactions within a selected period to identify sales trends and manage collectable debts.
  • Customer - Top 10 List Excel (Excel report): Review customers with the most transactions in a selected period directly in Excel. Identify sales trends and manage debt collections.
  • Customer - Trial Balance (report): Analyze and reconcile your customer balances at the end of the period by viewing the opening balance, each transaction within the period, and the closing balance grouped by customer.
  • Customer List (report): Get an overview of basic information for your customers.
  • Customer Statement (report): Send customers an overview of outstanding amounts, and also use as a payment reminder about overdue amounts.
  • Customer/Item Sales (report): Analyze your item sales per customer to understand sales trends, optimize inventory management, and improve marketing efforts. Assess the relationship between discounts, sales amounts, and the volume of item sales.
  • Day Book Customer Ledger Entry (report): Get a daily transaction overview for customer postings, similar in intent to a sales day book or a chronological audit-style listing of customer postings.
  • Day Book VAT Entry (report): Lists all VAT entries by document date in a register-style format. Use this report to review or audit tax postings across sales and purchase documents. Helpful for reconciliation and historical reference.
  • Day Book Vendor Ledger Entry (report): Get a daily transaction overview for vendor postings, similar in intent to a vendor day book or a chronological audit-style listing of vendor postings.
  • Deferral Summary - G/L (report): Analyze how deferral entries affect general ledger accounts over time and reconcile recognized versus remaining deferred amounts as of a specific date.
  • Deferral Summary - Purchasing (report): Review deferred purchasing expenses by vendor and posting period to verify accrual accuracy.
  • Deferral Summary - Sales (report): Analyze deferred sales revenue by customer and period, showing recognized and remaining amounts as of a chosen balance date.
  • Detail Trial Balance (report): Audit and reconcile your general ledger balances at the end of the period by viewing the net change, opening balance, each transaction in the period and the closing balance grouped by G/L account.
  • Dimensions - Detail (report): Analyze your general ledger with dimension detail by building groups of dimensions for combinations of dimension values, and view a breakdown of general ledger entries for each segment.
  • Dimensions - Total (report): Analyze your general ledger with dimension totals by building groups of dimensions for combinations of dimension values, and calculate a general ledger balance total for each segment.
  • Financial Reporting (report): Analyze your chart of accounts with a configurable view of general ledger accounts. Simplifies reporting for typical scenarios such as balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements.
  • Fiscal Year Balance (report): Review opening and closing balances for each general ledger account within a selected fiscal year. Use this report to support fiscal year-end closing, reconciliation, and trend analysis.
  • Fixed assets reports: Explore the standard reports in Business Central that can help you track and manage your fixed assets.
  • Foreign Currency Balance (report 503): Displays account balances in both local and foreign currencies for G/L, customer, or vendor accounts. Use it for monitoring and reconciling multi-currency transactions, especially during revaluation or when reviewing exchange rate impacts.
  • G/L - VAT Reconciliation (report): Reconciles VAT amounts from the general ledger with VAT entries to ensure accurate tax filings. Use during VAT periods to validate that posted VAT entries match G/L amounts. Apply posting date and VAT period filters for precision.
  • G/L Consolidation Eliminations (report): Identifies and removes internal transactions between entities to prevent duplication in consolidated financial statements.
  • G/L Register (report): Review posted general ledger batches with entry numbers, posting dates, user IDs, and source descriptions to support audits and traceability.
  • Income Statement (report): Get an income statement that shows your income, cost of goods sold (COGS), gross profit, expenses, and net income.
  • Intercompany Transactions (report): Lists all posted intercompany sales, purchases, and journal entries between internal entities. Use it for reviewing and reconciling intercompany activity before financial consolidation to ensure transparency and balance across companies.
  • Purchase statistics (report): Keep track of vendor performance and ensure that your company is getting the best value for its money.
  • Receivables-Payables (report): Displays a side-by-side comparison of customer and vendor balances versus G/L control accounts to confirm consistency and highlight reconciliation issues.
  • Reconcile Cust. and Vend. Accs. (report): Understand the transactions for control general ledger accounts, and find discrepancies between your general ledger and customer and vendor ledgers.
  • Reminder report: Print or email issued reminders that show overdue customer invoices, interest, fees, and VAT so customers can settle outstanding balances.
  • Retained Earnings Statement (report): Get an Retained Earnings Statement that shows an overview of retained earnings from the start of a period, net income, and distributions to shareholders.
  • Sales Statistics (report): Analyze earnings from an individual customer or earnings trends.
  • Statement of Cashflows (report): Get an Statement of Cashflows that shows an overview of operating activities, investment activities, and finance activities.
  • Trial Balance (Excel report): Use Excel to view a snapshot of your chart of accounts at a given point to check the debit and credit net change and closing balance.
  • Trial Balance (report): View a snapshot of your chart of accounts at a given point and check the debit and credit net change and closing balance.
  • Trial Balance by Period (report): Get a detailed breakdown of your closing balances over 12 accounting periods for each general ledger account.
  • Trial Balance/Budget (Excel report): Use Excel to view a snapshot of your chart of accounts at a given point to check the debit and credit net change and closing balance compared to the budget.
  • Trial Balance/Budget (report): View a snapshot of your chart of accounts at a given point and check the debit and credit net change and closing balance compared to the budget.
  • VAT Exceptions (report): Identifies transactions where VAT was expected but not calculated or posted. Run this to catch inconsistencies before filing VAT returns.
  • VAT Reconciliation Report (report): Use before tax filing to ensure that VAT amounts calculated on documents match what was posted to the general ledger. This report compares VAT calculated from documents with the amounts posted to the VAT G/L accounts. Use during tax preparation.
  • VAT Register (report): Use this report to review individual VAT entries before filing, or when investigating discrepancies in tax calculations. Displays all VAT entries from posted sales, purchases, and journals. Use filters such as posting date, VAT business posting group, or document number to drill into specific transactions.
  • VAT Registration No. Check (report): Cross-check VAT registration numbers against the EU VAT Information Exchange System (VIES). Best used before submitting EU sales reports. Ensures the accuracy of VAT numbers, helping prevent compliance issues with cross-border VAT reporting.
  • VAT Statement (report): Use during VAT filing to calculate and report VAT due or refundable to tax authorities. Presents a structured summary of VAT based on the VAT Statement setup. Select the statement name and period to run the report accurately.
  • VAT- VIES Declaration Tax Auth (report): Creates a declaration of intra-community sales for submission to the VIES system. Make sure customer VAT numbers and country codes are correct before running. Prepares compliant VIES reports summarizing EU sales, helping meet legal obligations for cross-border transactions.
  • Vendor - Balance to Date (report): Keep track of your outstanding payables and manage your vendor relationships.
  • Vendor - Detail Trial Balance (report): Analyze and reconcile vendor balances at the end of a period.
  • Vendor - List (report): Use the report, for example, to maintain information about the vendor.
  • Vendor - Order Detail (report): Analyze your outstanding purchase orders to understand your expected purchase volume by vendor.
  • Vendor - Order Summary (report): Analyze your outstanding purchase orders to understand your expected purchase volume.
  • Vendor - Summary Aging (report): The Vendor - Summary Aging report is a legacy report for aged accounts payable. We recommend that you use Aged Accounts Payables report instead.
  • Vendor - Top 10 List Excel (Excel report): Analyze the effect of vendors on cash flow, and prioritize vendor payments.
  • Vendor - Trial Balance (report): Analyze the closing balance of vendors at the end of the period and reconcile the vendor subledger against the payables accounts in the general ledger.
  • Vendor Pre-Payment Journal (report): The report can be used to check payments before creating payment files and posting the journal.
  • Vendor/Item Purchases (report): Analyze your item purchases per vendor to manage inventory procurement and improve supply chain processes. Assess the relationship between discounts, the cost amount, and the volume of item purchases.
  • Work with financial overviews in Excel (legacy): Learn about how you can open the financial statements in Microsoft Excel from Business Central for better analysis.

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