Need to create a consolidating company in Lawson 9.0 but I have no idea how to start

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TeresaE
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We are just looking at creating consolidating financials in Lawson 9.0 this year rather than continue creating them manually in Excel. I am wondering if anyone could point me toward any good articles, instructions on how to go about setting up the consolidating companies because I don't have a clue where to begin.
Deleted User
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I have done this several times although I haven't found any articles on it (I have a powerpoint on consolidation, currency and other complexity which I gave to a Lawson user group if you'd like).
A few points:
1) Consolidation companies in Lawson have no special features. They are just more GL Companies. Lawson doesn't have proper consolidation features in standard financials but it can be made to work.
2) You'll need to create multiple consolidation companies depending on the number of levels of consolidation.
for example, a client has multiple entities in the US and Europe. US companies roll up into a US holding company, European companies roll up into a UK holding company and everything rolls up into a worldwide holding company.
So, we established the following structure
Cos 1-97 - US Operating cos
company 98 - US holding company
Co 99 - Elimination among US entitiies
Cos100-198 - European Operating Cos
Co 198 - European Holding co
co 199- Elimination among European operating Cos
Co 298 - Worldwide holding company
co 299 - Elimination among worldwide entities
3) Accounts are key.
Depending on how your entities transact business, eliminating the different transactions can be challenging.
It's important to be able to identify each intercompany relationship and make sure it gets to zero. Depending on your chart structure, you may be able to include the counterparty in the subaccount. In any case, we've used attributes to identify where the elimination should happen. This and some work in excel allows one to automate the elimination process.
4) think process process process
If you have multiple entities with different groups entering transactions, get clear rules established about when those entries get booked.

I hope this helps. The key thing to ask: Do you know exactly how your consolidation is done today? If it is, getting into Lawson isn't bad. If it's a mess now (and some excel processes are), than you've got to get that cleaned up before you get Lawson working well.

TeresaE
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I would love a copy of the powerpoint if I could have one. I'm new to LawsonGuru, so I don't know if I just post my email, or if you can see it.

As for the consolidations today, I do them in Excel. They are pretty clean for the most part, the only somewhat messy part is the Statement of Cash Flows, and I don't even know if Lawson does a statement of cash flows.
John Henley
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If Adam is willing he can attach his ppt to this topic, or email it to me and I'll post it.
Thanks for using the LawsonGuru.com forums!
John
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I'll be in the office by Friday and I'll have time to find the powerpoint.
As for statement of cash flows, it doesn't exist out of the box but it can be built with RW100.
You often need to setup a few additional accounts like separating Fixed Asset additions from fixed asset disposals.
(if you don't have currency issues which makes it more of a mess as per GAAP one needs to separate out effects based on changes in underlying accounts and affects caused by currency swing)
TeresaE
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So far we shouldn't have any currency issues becasue we only do business in the US at this point in time. I was thinking I'd end up having to create a Stmt of Cash Flows using RW100 if they wanted one. Thank you so much for your help on this.
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here is the presentation PDF. Please note that it was designed for a presentation so it won't give you a step by step process.
good luck.
Adam
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TeresaE
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Thank you this should at least get me pointed in the right direction. :-)