Year-end statutory work rarely lives in one place.
The trial balance comes from one system. The accounts and workpapers get built in another. The accounts themselves get produced somewhere else again - filing with Companies House often means a fourth tool on top of that.
None of these steps are difficult on their own. The time gets lost in moving data between them, checking it still ties out, and repeating the process for every client at year-end.
That’s the problem we built Ledger & Reporting to solve.
We’ve just released Accounts production in Active: a connected workflow that takes a firm from trial balance through to a filed set of accounts, without leaving the platform.
Why year-end still means switching systems
For most firms, the statutory accounts workflow looks something like this:
- Export the trial balance from the bookkeeping system or client records
- Build or update accounts and workpapers in a separate tool or spreadsheet
- Produce the FRS 102 1A, 105 &, or the LLP, partnership or sole trader equivalent, in a dedicated accounts production tool
- Go back and forth between workpapers and accounts with adjustments that are required
- Export the finished accounts and file separately with Companies House, often through a tool like Inform Direct or Companies House WebFiling
Every handoff in that chain is a place where something can go wrong. Figures get rekeyed. Versions drift apart. A late adjustment made in one system doesn’t always make it into the next. Reviewers end up spending time confirming the numbers still match rather than reviewing the accounting itself.
What UK firms should look for in statutory accounts software
Most firms aren’t looking for another standalone tool. They’re looking for statutory accounts software that removes steps from the process rather than adding one more system to manage.
That’s a different test to the one most year-end accounts software gets judged on. It isn’t only about how the accounts production screen looks, or how many formats it covers. It’s about how much of the surrounding process, the trial balance, the accounts and workpapers, the filing, still has to happen somewhere else.
Active is built around that question. The accounts production step isn’t bolted onto a separate workpapers tool. It’s part of the same platform, working from the same data.
One flow, one platform
Active connects the trial balance, accounts and work papers, FRS 102 accounts production, and Companies House filing into a single, continuous flow.
In practice, that looks like this:
- The trial balance and supporting data flow directly into Active’s accounts and work papers, whether the client is on Xero, QuickBooks, FreeAgent, or working from a CSV import.
- Accounts and workpapers are prepared and reviewed within the same environment, with adjustments reflected automatically rather than exported and reimported.
- FRS 102, FRS 102 1A, 105 & Dormant Company Accounts, along with LLP, partnership and sole trader accounts, are produced directly from that same data, so the accounts tie back to the accounts and work papers by construction, not by reconciliation.
- Once the accounts are complete, they can be filed directly to Companies House from within Active, without exporting to a separate filing tool.
None of this removes professional judgement. Accountants still review, adjust and sign off every step. What disappears is the manual movement of data between systems that was never adding value to the accounts themselves.
What’s included in this release
Statutory work isn’t one type of client. The product already includes:
- FRS 102
- FRS 102 1A
- FRS 105
- Dormant Company Accounts
- LLPs
- Partnerships
- Sole traders
This is just the beginning of what we’re building; we already have FRS 101, Charities, IFRS, SORPS and Trusts roadmapped, and we will keep adding report formats in short order.
A firm doesn’t need a separate process, or a separate tool, for each of these. The same connected flow, from trial balance to filing, applies whatever structure the client sits under.
That’s the scope of this release, and it’s the foundation for what’s coming next.
Companies House filing, without leaving the platform
Once statutory accounts are finalised, they can be filed directly to Companies House from inside Active.
There’s no separate export, no third-party filing tool, and no re-entering of data that’s already been prepared and reviewed. For firms specifically evaluating Companies House filing accounting software, this removes one of the last remaining points of friction in the year-end process, the step that most platforms still leave outside their own workflow.
What this means day to day
The impact isn’t dramatic on any single job. It shows up in the volume of small, repetitive tasks that disappear across a full year-end season: fewer exports, fewer reconciliations between systems, fewer late-stage surprises when a number doesn’t match across tools.
That time moves somewhere more useful. Reviewers get more time for the accounting judgement calls that actually need attention, rather than confirming the mechanics still work. Partners get more visibility over where jobs stand without chasing updates across systems. Firms get through statutory year-end season with less friction, not by cutting corners, but by removing steps that were never adding value in the first place.
See it with your own client data
If your firm is currently switching between systems for trial balance, accounts and work papers, accounts production and Companies House filing, it’s worth seeing how the connected version compares.
Sign up to try this out with your own client data, and we’ll walk you through a real file together.