How to automate GL mapping
Every month, Finance teams must ensure expenses and invoice line items are accurately mapped to the correct GL accounts, often across multiple cost centers and sales channels. When data comes from vendors in various unstructured formats, this process can quickly consume dozens of hours and involve extracting cost data from invoices and reclassifying expenses — ultimately slowing down the month-end close process.
With Parabola, you can automatically map expenses and line items to the corresponding GL accounts based on custom logic — eliminating the manual data entry and reconciliation process. Beyond GL mapping, Parabola Flows can automatically format data to match the exact structure required by your internal systems for accurate reporting and smooth data upload with your ERP or accounting system.
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GL mapping is the process of categorizing and assigning financial transactions, expenses, and journal entries to the appropriate General Ledger (GL) accounts. This ensures that financial data is accurately structured for reporting, cost allocation, and compliance. Manual GL mapping can be time-consuming, especially when dealing with multiple cost centers, business units, and sales channels. Automating this process improves accuracy, reduces close times, and enables real-time financial analysis.
- Import financial data from spreadsheets, ERPs, or accounting systems using Pull from 663559c9207f91d5a1baa251, Pull from Google Sheets, or Pull from API steps.
- Standardize and clean the data with steps like Edit Columns and Extract with AI to ensure consistent formatting across sources.
- Map transactions to GL accounts using predefined rules in the Find and Replace or If/Else Column steps.
- Allocate costs across cost centers, sales channels, or business units by applying formulas in the Add Math Column step.
- Reclassify expenses programmatically using logic-based rules to ensure accurate financial reporting.
- Compare actual costs against forecasts by integrating budget data and using a Combine Tables step to flag discrepancies.
- Export the structured data back to your ERP or accounting system with Send to API or Export to Google Sheets for real-time financial visibility.
- Standardize transaction data early in your Flow to minimize downstream formatting issues.
- Leverage Parabola's AI tools to clean and structure unstructured financial data for better accuracy.
- Automate data exports to your ERP or BI tools to streamline reporting and close processes faster.
- To start building your own GL mapping Flow, check out Parabola University.
