The Fiscal Periods tab is where the company fiscal calendar and year end date are decided. There are 3 fiscal years available for posting, the Current year and the years immediately before and after the current year. Each fiscal year is divided into 12 or 13 fiscal periods.
Current Year End – Usually the year end date is selected when the company data is first configured and not changed after that. But if the company is changing the fiscal calendar, the year end date can be edited to an earlier date, thereby creating a shorter Current Fiscal Year. See the topic regarding Changing Fiscal Period for more information.
Locked Periods – If you want to prevent accidental posting to earlier periods, because financial statements have been finalized for those older months or years, you can set the Locked periods count to prevent transaction posting with dates in these ranges. Locked Periods are consecutive and counted from the first period of Last year, and then through the Current year and finally Next year.
Number of Periods – When initially configuring the company data, you may choose 12 fiscal periods of one month duration each, or 13 fiscal periods of 4 week duration each. After a transaction has been posted, this choice cannot be changed.
Historical – The Historical tab displays all the previous fiscal year calendars that have transactions. See the topic regarding Historical Periods for more information.