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The ‘Chart of Accounts’ (CoA) is in Step 3 of the company's 'Settings'.

The correct order and classification of accounts will ensure the accurate calculation of your financial KPIs and a meaningful presentation of your financial statements.

The first time you import from your source accounting system, Fathom will do its best to replicate the existing chart of accounts structure to provide a helpful layout.

Fathom will also set the terminology for the company based on the default terminology for your organisation.

For subsequent updates, the structure, hierarchy, and terminology of your CoA in Fathom (including ordering, headings, and classifications) will all be retained according to your settings in Fathom.

While Fathom will automatically classify your accounts. It is a good idea to review the classifications to ensure they are correct.

Fathom assigns a primary and sub-classification to each account. This is how Fathom is able to recognise what kind of account it is, and this forms the basis for how the account is treated in calculations.

View the classification guidelines to see a detailed explanation of each account classification.

You can reclassify accounts in three different ways:

To make customisations more quickly, you're able to select several accounts at once. You can reclassify all the accounts you've selected or create a heading or subheading that encompasses all the selected accounts.

You can easily select a range of accounts by selecting an account, and then shift-click to select another. All accounts between these two will be selected. This is useful if you have multiple accounts in a row that you wish to select.

The customisation options for your Chart of Accounts include:

Fathom enables you to group accounts under headings and subheadings.

Grouping accounts creates structure and hierarchy, which flows through when viewing your financial statements in the analysis tools and reports. You can then collapse and expand headings to show different levels of detail. A subtotal will be shown for every group.

For more information on creating groups of accounts under headings and subheadings, view our 'Headings & Subheadings' article.

Easily reposition accounts by dragging and dropping. You can drag and drop accounts into different headings or across to different classifications (e.g. drag and drop an Expense account into Cost of Sales).

After selecting multiple accounts, you can reposition them by dragging and dropping them or by clicking 'Move to' in the menu bar at the top of the screen. You can then select any heading/subheading to move these accounts instantly. This is helpful if you have a large Chart of Accounts with multiple headings.

You have several options to change the way you view or sort your Chart of Accounts by clicking the 'View/Sort' icon at the top-right of your CoA (next to the 'Revenue' classification heading).

To re-order accounts alphabetically,

Select the checkbox to show or hide account codes. Fathom will source account codes directly from your accounting system. This checkbox will be greyed out if you do not have any account codes.

To re-order accounts according to account code,

To view archived accounts as you're re-organising your Chart of Accounts,

Archived accounts are still imported into Fathom when they have historical data in order for accounts to reconcile correctly.

You can quickly identify the status of an account using a small coloured indicator. For more information, visit our guide to Chart of Account Status updates.

Congratulations on setting up and organising your Chart of Accounts! Any decisions you made in your Chart of Accounts in Fathom can be changed later on if needed. Continue the 'Getting Started Workflow' and finish setting up your company for analysis, reporting, and forecasting by choosing from one of the next steps below:

Additional knowledge and common questions