ClosedLoop — the spec

ClosedLoop is a SaaS accounting platform for internal finance teams that collapses the general ledger, month-end close, and AP/AR payments into one system. The core premise: because every payment and invoice posts directly to the double-entry ledger the moment it happens, the close is never a reconciliation exercise — it is already done.

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Decisions locked

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The core loop

1. A vendor invoice or customer payment enters the system — keyed manually, uploaded, or pulled from a connected bank feed.
2. The unified double-entry ledger posts the debit and credit immediately; no import, no staging table.
3. The team member opens the month-end close view; all transactions already appear against their chart-of-accounts lines.
4. The system flags any entry that is unposted, unmatched, or outside tolerance — the list is short because the ledger has been live all month.
5. The team member clears the flags, locks the period, and the close is complete.

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v1 scope

Unified double-entry ledger
Every transaction — AP bill, AR invoice, payment, journal entry — posts a balanced debit/credit pair to the same ledger in real time. This is the single source of truth; no other system holds authoritative balances. Lives on the Ledger and Journal Entry screens.

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Deliberately later

The following features are scoped to v2 and beyond. Each earns its place once the core ledger has proven its integrity under real load.

• Real-time AP approval and payment execution — approval workflows introduce role and permission complexity that belongs on top of a proven ledger, not inside it at launch.
• Automatic bank and card reconciliation sync — feed integrations with US and Canadian financial institutions require partner agreements and exception-handling logic; adds little value until the ledger is trusted.
• Multi-entity consolidation for close — inter-company eliminations and consolidated reporting are a Layer 2 concern; the single-entity close must be clean first.
• Audit trail and workflow enforcement rules — immutable audit logs and segregation-of-duties rules are compliance features that follow after the data model is stable.
• US and Canada tax compliance templates — HST/GST, sales tax nexus, and payroll tax mapping require jurisdiction-specific maintenance; scope after the transaction layer is solid.
• AR aging and invoice collection dashboard — useful analytics, but downstream of having reliable AR data in the ledger for at least one full cycle.
• Close checklist with variance alerts — high value once teams have a baseline period to compare against; premature in month one.

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Data model sketch

• users — id, name, email, role, team_id, created_at
• accounts — id, code, name, type (asset/liability/equity/revenue/expense), currency, entity_id
• journal_entries — id, entry_date, description, period_id, created_by, status (draft/posted/locked)
• journal_lines — id, journal_entry_id, account_id, debit_amount, credit_amount, currency, fx_rate
• transactions — id, type (bill/invoice/payment/manual), counterparty_id, amount, currency, status, linked_journal_entry_id
• counterparties — id, name, type (vendor/customer), country (US/CA), payment_details
• periods — id, entity_id, year, month, status (open/closed/locked), closed_by, closed_at
• entities — id, name, country, base_currency, chart_of_accounts_template

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Screens

• Dashboard — real-time snapshot of open periods, unposted entries, and outstanding transactions requiring attention.
• Ledger — paginated, filterable view of all posted journal lines by account and date range; the authoritative balance view.
• Journal Entry — form for creating and editing manual journal entries with inline debit/credit validation before posting.
• Transactions — list of all bills, invoices, and payments with their posting status and linked journal entry.
• Transaction Detail — single transaction view showing the generated journal lines, counterparty, and edit/void actions.
• Month-End Close — period-level view listing all open items, unmatched entries, and a one-click lock action once the list is clear.
• Settings — chart of accounts management, user roles, entity configuration, and currency preferences.

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How to use this document

• Bring it into Mind Palace, where the guided platform and its AI coach pick up from exactly this document and build the product with you step by step.
• Hand it to a developer as the complete v1 brief — scope, data model, and screen list are all here.
• Keep it as the single source of truth while you build, so every feature decision can be checked against what is locked above.