Overview

Archiving lets you reduce Accounting Seed data storage by moving general ledger transaction data from closed Accounting Periods into Salesforce Big Objects. Archiving is permanent and cannot be undone - review the reporting and data considerations in this article before proceeding.

In this article:

• Understanding Archiving
• Impact on Reporting
  • Financial Reports on Archived Period
  • Financial Reports Drill Down Ability
  • Accounting Seed Management / Salesforce Reports
• Other Things to Consider Before Archiving
  • Impact on Accounting Period being Archived
  • Custom Fields on the Transaction Object
  • Ledger Hierarchies
  • Source Documents
• Archive an Accounting Period
  • Eligible Accounting Periods
  • Before You Begin
  • Steps to Archive an Accounting Period

Understanding Archiving

Archiving is an irreversible process; when you archive an Accounting Period the system removes general ledger transaction data for the selected period from two Accounting Seed objects: Transactions and Financial Cube Transactions.

• Transaction records:
  • They are the detailed line-level entries that are the postings to the general ledger. For example, when you post a source document like a Cash Receipt, its transactions are posted to the GL.
  • Once an Accounting Period is archived, its transactions are moved to a Salesforce Big Object, which is a Salesforce storage tier designed to hold large volumes of historical data.
• Financial Cube Transaction records:
  • They are granular period-level ledger entries that feed into Financial Cube summaries.
  • Once an Accounting Period is archived, its Financial Cube Transaction records are permanently deleted and cannot be recovered.

Archiving a period does not affect:

• Source documents created and posted in the archived period and
• Financial Cubes which are summary-level balances that remain accessible for reporting after archiving.

Impact on Reporting

Financial Reports on Archived Period

The financial reports that you can run on an archived period are notated with "yes" in the table below.  The Ledger Inquiry report is not supported for archived periods.  

Report	Financial Reports Hub	Legacy Financial Reporter
Profit and Loss	yes	yes
Profit and Loss vs. Budget	yes	yes
Balance Sheet	yes	yes
Trial Balance	yes	yes
Cash Flow	-*	yes
Custom Financial Reports	-*	yes
GL level reporting	yes (General Ledger)	Not supported (Ledger Inquiry)

*These reports are expected in a future release.

Financial Reports Drill Down Ability

In the Financial Reports Hub and legacy Financial Reporter, you can drill down and see limited source object detail for the supported reports listed in the table above.

Accounting Seed Management / Salesforce Reports

You can run your Management or Salesforce reports on an archived period as long as the report is not using the transactions object. The out of the box Accounting Seed reports not supported on an archived period include:

• Transaction Detail by GL
• Transaction Detail by GL account
• Transaction Exceptions

Other Things to Consider Before Archiving

Impact on Accounting Period being Archived

• Archiving is permanent and cannot be undone. There is no way to "unarchive" or reverse the process.
• Archived periods cannot be reopened, so records can no longer be posted or unposted.

Custom Fields on the Transaction Object

Custom fields you added to the Transaction object are permanently deleted during archiving and are not stored in Big Objects. If those fields contain data you need to retain, export them before archiving.

Ledger Hierarchies

If you have run the Consolidations routine for the period you are archiving, the associated Ledger Hierarchies can no longer be modified after archiving. Consolidating journal entries, intercompany eliminations, and other consolidation adjustments for that period are permanently locked. Complete any Consolidations adjustments for the period before proceeding.

Source Documents

Archiving does not affect or change the source objects in the archived accounting Period. The following remain unchanged in your environment:

• Billings
• Cash Receipts and Applications (Billing Cash Receipts)
• Payables
• Cash Disbursements and Applications (AP Disbursements)
• Journal Entries
• Amortization Entries
• Time Cards
• Inventory Movements

Archive an Accounting Period

Eligible Accounting Periods

Only Accounting Periods that are at least 15 periods in the past are eligible for archiving. For most organizations using monthly periods, this means data that is at least 15 months old.

To confirm a period is eligible, navigate to the Accounting Period Detail screen. The Archive button appears only for periods that meet the eligibility criteria.

To lower the minimum threshold, contact Accounting Seed Support. Before requesting a reduction, confirm the change complies with your organization's record retention requirements.

Before You Begin

Before archiving an Accounting Period, confirm the following:

• You have reviewed the reporting and other limitations and considerations in this article.

• You understand that this process is permanent.

• You have exported any custom Transaction object field data you need to retain since this data is permanently deleted during archiving.

• If your organization runs the Consolidations routine, all consolidation adjustments for the period are final.

• You have System Administrator permissions in Salesforce and the AS Full Admin permission set assigned to your user.

• The Accounting Period to be archived is in the Closed status: the Archive button only appears for Closed periods.

Steps to Archive an Accounting Period

1. Navigate to Accounting Home > click the Setup menu > under Ledgers, click Accounting Periods.

2. Click the Accounting Period you want to archive to open the record detail screen.

3. Click Archive.

4. The following info message is posted on the screen:

   

5. Once you confirm, archiving runs as a background process. Processing time varies depending on data volume.

6. When archiving is complete, you will receive an email notification and the period's Status will change to Archived. If you do not receive a confirmation email within 24 hours, contact Accounting Seed Support.

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Related articles:

• Purge Data
• Delete Archived Source Documents Guidance

 

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