Business Management

Business Management is where advisory firms onboard and maintain client businesses. Each business is fully isolated — its own chart of accounts, bank connections, invoices, bills, and reports — so changes to one never touch another. From this Practice Management page you add new clients, edit per-business settings, and jump straight into a client's Books workspace.

Key capabilities

• Per-business book isolation (separate ledgers, connections, invoices, and reports)
• Add Business to onboard a new client by name
• Editable per-business settings: name, logo URL, entries start date, currency, tax year-end month, accounting basis, mailbox prefix, inventory mode
• Default currency options: USD, CAD, AUD, EUR, GBP
• Accounting basis: accrual or cash
• Inventory mode: Finished goods (resale) or CPG (production, recipes, landed COGS)
• Mailbox prefix per business for AP email forwarding (unique per business)
• Businesses table showing name, assigned teams, subscription status, and entries-start date
• Open link that jumps into the business's Books workspace
• Subscription status badge driven by the business's Stripe subscription

How it works

Each business is a self-contained workspace; the firm sits above all of them and switches context per business.

flowchart TD
  firm["Advisory firm"] --> list["Businesses page"]
  list --> add["Add Business (name)"]
  list --> edit["Edit business settings"]
  list --> open["Open in Books"]
  add --> iso["Isolated books: ledger / connections / reports"]
  edit --> iso
  open --> books["Open in /books?business=ID"]

How to use it

1. Open Settings > Businesses.
2. Click Add Business and enter the client's name to create it.
3. Click a row (or Edit) to open Business Settings and set logo URL, entries start date, default currency, tax year-end month, accounting basis, mailbox prefix, and inventory mode.
4. Click Save Changes — currency, basis, tax month, mailbox, and inventory mode save together; the entries-start date is applied separately.
5. Use Open to jump into that business's Books workspace.
6. Use the sidebar business switcher to move between clients without returning to settings.

Pro tips

• Set the inventory mode correctly during onboarding — CPG exposes Supply Chain, Production, and Landed COGS; Finished goods hides them.
• Configure the mailbox prefix before forwarding vendor bills so AP email extraction is directed to the right business.
• Confirm accounting basis (accrual vs cash) with the client up front — it changes how reports recognize revenue and expenses.
• Assign teams to businesses (on the Teams page) so staff access scales without per-person management.
• Use Refresh after bulk onboarding to repopulate the table and team chips.

In-depth guide

Businesses table columns

Editable business settings

Isolation model

• A business owns its ledgers, bank/integration connections, customers, vendors, products, invoices, bills, and reports.
• The firm-to-business relationship is tracked separately and can be active or inactive — this is how a firm starts or ends management of a client without destroying data.

Solo vs advisory

This dedicated page is advisory-only. Solo accounts have a single business and edit the equivalent settings inline on the Profile page under Business Settings.

Access and assignment

Who can see a business is governed by staff roles and assignments:

• Owners and admins: see every business.
• Members: see only businesses assigned to them directly or through a team.

Manage those assignments on the Staff and Teams pages.

Data preservation

• Businesses are never permanently deleted — data is retained for reference, taxes, and audit.
• To stop managing a client, deactivate the firm-business relationship rather than destroying records.

Edge cases

• The Add Business modal only collects a name; everything else is set afterward in Business Settings.
• Demo businesses appear in workflows but cannot manage billing.
• If no firm is selected, the page shows a "No firm selected." placeholder.