Guides Checklist
Quarterly rebate close checklist: reconciling earned, received and booked
A printable close routine for supplier rebates: check the data, recalculate earned, match receipts, age what is owed, book the accrual and file the evidence.
Version 1.1, last reviewed September 19, 2026
Printed with nothing answered, it is a blank form to work through on paper.
Answer for your hospital, not for us. Mark each item Yes, Partly or No, and note the evidence where you have it. A yes with no evidence noted counts as partly. Your answers are kept in this browser and nothing is sent to us.
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Run this close after every rebate period ends, once the late-transaction window in your agreements has passed, and finish it within a fixed number of working days. Supply chain finance owns it. Bring contracting or category management, general accounting, whoever applies cash, and the analyst who owns the purchase data. The output is three figures for every contract and period, with each gap between them explained and assigned to a named person. Score each item yes, partly or no for your most recent close, with the evidence beside it. A yes without evidence counts as partly.
The three figures
| Figure | What it is | Where it goes wrong |
|---|---|---|
| Earned | What the agreement owes on the period’s purchases, from your own calculation | Calculated on incomplete data, or edited to match what the supplier paid |
| Received | Checks, electronic payments, credit memos and free goods matched to a contract and period | Recorded but never matched to a period, so the period still reads unpaid |
| Booked | What the general ledger holds: the accrual, the receivable and the credits to cost centers | Booked on a cash basis, or credited to one account for the whole system |
Keep earned and received apart. Netting them destroys the evidence that a shortfall existed.
Before the close
Measure your baseline first
- Your last close measured as a baseline: working days from the end of the late-transaction window to sign-off, contracts in scope with all three figures, variances above tolerance with no logged cause, and suspense items past their deadline.
1. Set the cut-off
- Period end date, late-transaction window and close date confirmed for each contract. A figure read on the day a period ends is provisional.
- Trigger date confirmed for each contract: purchase order date, invoice date or receipt date.
- Contracts in scope listed: every agreement with a period ending this quarter, plus annual agreements whose accrual needs updating.
2. Check the data
- Purchase, invoice and distributor sales tracing files loaded for the whole period, with rows and dollars by supplier tied to the payables subledger.
- Late invoices, credit notes and rebills dated in earlier periods listed. They belong to the period of their original date and will change a figure you already reported.
- New facilities, cost centers and ship-to accounts mapped. An unmapped facility drops out of scope without an error.
- New item numbers mapped to contract products and categories.
- Unit-of-measure exceptions cleared on unit-based tiers. A box of 20 counted as one unit undercounts by a factor of 20.
- Purchases through authorized distributors counted as the supplier’s volume, not as competitor volume, on share commitments.
3. Update the contract register
- Amendments, renewals, extensions and expirations since the last close entered with effective dates. An amendment edits the existing contract. Entered as a second contract, it double-counts the supplier.
- New agreements added with an owner, period calendar, payment terms and dispute window.
- Compliance forms, attestations and reports due this period filed, with proof of submission kept. Volume can reach the tier and the rebate still be forfeited over a late form.
Running the close
4. Calculate earned
- Eligible spend or units totaled by contract term, from the purchase record the agreement names.
- Tier determined and the clause type confirmed: retrospective, paid on all purchases, or stepped, paid on the increment only.
- Growth and share results written as a ratio with numerator and denominator, not only a percentage. A share measured against the supplier’s own products alone reads 100 percent every period.
- Gating commitments tested before the rebates they gate are counted.
- Year-to-date tiers and true-ups adjusted. Interim quarters on a year-end true-up read zero by design.
- Every zero explained as either a threshold missed or a data and scope fault.
- Calculation file saved with the date and the data cut-off.
If a zero has no obvious cause, work through why a rebate reads zero before accepting it. To write one share commitment as a ratio, use the market-share commitment worksheet.
5. Compare with the supplier
- Supplier statement or calculation requested where none arrived.
- Comparison made period by period. A check covering three quarters set against a year-to-date total looks about right and proves nothing.
- Variances above tolerance logged with one cause each: data, tier, eligibility or timing.
- Disputes opened in writing inside the contract’s window, with line-level detail attached.
Both sides want the agreement paid as written. A line-level comparison settles most differences faster than a letter.
6. Match receipts
- Every check, electronic payment, credit memo and free-goods shipment matched to contract, term and period.
- Bank reconciled by received date, earned reconciled by period date. Mixing the two produces false mismatches.
- Unexplained receipts parked on a suspense list with an owner and a deadline, not applied until matched.
- Overpayments investigated. They can mean purchases you cannot see, or a different scope on the supplier’s side.
- Price credits and overcharge refunds kept out of rebate receipts.
7. Age the receivable
- Earned-not-received listed by supplier, contract and period, aged from each contract’s expected payment date.
- Past-due items escalated along an agreed path, with dates.
- Periods approaching the contract’s claim or lookback limit flagged with the deadline.
- Write-offs supported by the supplier’s calculation, not by the passage of time.
8. Book and allocate
- Accrual true-up journal prepared: the rebate on cumulative eligible purchases at the tier judged probable, less the amount accrued to date.
- Credits allocated to cost centers and facilities in proportion to their eligible purchases.
- Supplier rebates, group purchasing fee share-backs and local-agreement rebates kept in separate accounts.
- Tier judgment signed by supply chain, entry signed by accounting.
An illustrative contract: $120,000 earned to date, $100,000 accrued and $90,000 received. The close posts a $20,000 true-up and leaves a $30,000 receivable to age. The estimating method is covered in rebate accruals for hospital finance; agree it with your auditors.
9. File the evidence
- One folder per contract and period: terms in force, calculation file, purchase detail, supplier documentation, remittance, payment proof and dispute correspondence.
- Figures exported as signed off. Late data will move them, and the export is the only record of what you approved.
- Group purchasing organization’s annual written fee disclosure reconciled to share-backs received, when it arrives.
This file also supports the Medicare cost report. 42 CFR 413.98 treats discounts and allowances received on purchases as reductions of the costs they relate to, not as income. Among the conditions of the discount safe harbor at 42 CFR 1001.952(h), a buyer that files a cost report must report the discount fully and accurately and, on request from HHS or a state agency, provide the information the seller gave it. Paragraph (j) has a group purchasing organization disclose to each provider member in writing, at least annually, what it received from each vendor on that member’s purchases. This is a summary, not legal or accounting advice: ask your reimbursement and compliance teams how these rules apply to a specific arrangement.
Measuring and reporting
10. Look forward and report
- Gap to next tier and current pace listed for each open period. Label it as pace, not a promise.
- Commitments running short assigned to category managers and service lines, with actions and dates.
- One page for the chief financial officer and supply chain leader: earned, received, booked, open disputes, dollars at risk, recoveries to date, and restatements of earlier periods with their cause.
For one contract at a time, the rebate tier pace worksheet works out the current pace and the gap to the next tier from your own numbers, in your browser.
What good looks like
- The close finishes inside its target every quarter, for example 15 working days after the late-transaction window shuts.
- Every contract in scope shows all three figures, and every variance above tolerance has a logged cause and an owner.
- The suspense list holds nothing past its deadline.
- No dispute was opened outside a contract window, and no compliance form went in late.
- Anyone on the team can produce the calculation behind a payment within an hour.
Your tally
Your answers
You have answered 0 of 43 items.
As the checklist says, a yes with no evidence noted is counted as partly.
| Section | Yes | Partly | No | Not answered |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Before the close | ||||
| Measure your baseline first | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 1. Set the cut-off | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| 2. Check the data | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 |
| 3. Update the contract register | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Running the close | ||||
| 4. Calculate earned | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7 |
| 5. Compare with the supplier | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| 6. Match receipts | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| 7. Age the receivable | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| 8. Book and allocate | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| 9. File the evidence | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Measuring and reporting | ||||
| 10. Look forward and report | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| All items | 0 | 0 | 0 | 43 |
What to work on
Nothing yet. Each item you answer No or Partly is listed here, with what addresses it.
Gaps Rebate Recovery addresses
Each note names what the product does and where your team still decides.
Period end date, late-transaction window and close date confirmed for each contract. A figure read on the day a period ends is provisional.
Pay periods are generated for each contract with their grace days and calculation date. The close date is your calendar.
Trigger date confirmed for each contract: purchase order date, invoice date or receipt date.
Each rebate is set to read the purchase record the agreement names, such as invoices, purchase orders or receipts.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead what happens when a rebate reads the wrong record
Purchase, invoice and distributor sales tracing files loaded for the whole period, with rows and dollars by supplier tied to the payables subledger.
Each file is validated before it loads, with a plain verdict on what will load, what will be skipped and why, and an upload history. Tying the totals to the payables subledger stays with you.
New facilities, cost centers and ship-to accounts mapped. An unmapped facility drops out of scope without an error.
A facility named on a rebate rule that matches no hospital record is kept as written, pays $0 and raises a ‘facility not assigned’ alert, rather than being guessed. Mapping new cost centers and ship-to accounts to their hospital stays in your close.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead how a facility scope resolves to nothing
New item numbers mapped to contract products and categories.
Contract products can be kept in step with the item master, and the tag coverage report shows spend that carries no tag and rules that name a tag no product carries.
The tag coverage report: released to administrators first.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead about tags no product carries
Unit-of-measure exceptions cleared on unit-based tiers. A box of 20 counted as one unit undercounts by a factor of 20.
Pack-invoiced products are counted in eaches on unit-based terms, and a missing eaches conversion raises an alert.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead about the unit-of-measure failure
Purchases through authorized distributors counted as the supplier’s volume, not as competitor volume, on share commitments.
Each contract records which companies are parties and which are authorized distributors, and a share commitment applies the same market definition to both sides of the fraction.
Amendments, renewals, extensions and expirations since the last close entered with effective dates. An amendment edits the existing contract. Entered as a second contract, it double-counts the supplier.
Contract documents hold the agreement, amendments and exhibits with effective dates, and the AI loader turns an amendment away rather than importing it as a second contract. Entering the change is still a person’s job.
Contract documents: released to administrators first.
New agreements added with an owner, period calendar, payment terms and dispute window.
The contract wizard sets dates, frequency, payment type and pay periods, and reads each term back in plain English to check against the clause.
Compliance forms, attestations and reports due this period filed, with proof of submission kept. Volume can reach the tier and the rebate still be forfeited over a late form.
Compliance-form deadlines are tracked, with alerts as the due and forfeiture dates approach, and attestations are recorded with who, when and the paper behind them. Keeping proof that a form was sent stays with you.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead about the form nobody filed
Eligible spend or units totaled by contract term, from the purchase record the agreement names.
The engine totals eligible spend or units for every program and period and writes a plain-language note for each result.
Tier determined and the clause type confirmed: retrospective, paid on all purchases, or stepped, paid on the increment only.
Retrospective and stepped tiers are both modelled as written, and each term reads its set-up back in plain English so the clause type can be checked.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead how to tell retrospective from stepped
Growth and share results written as a ratio with numerator and denominator, not only a percentage. A share measured against the supplier’s own products alone reads 100 percent every period.
Share is shown as a ratio with a plain verdict, and alerts fire when a market holds only the supplier’s own products or is far too wide.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead about the denominator problem
Gating commitments tested before the rebates they gate are counted.
A rebate gated on a commitment is counted only when the commitment is met or attested. Otherwise it books as lost, or as still winnable while the period is open, with the reason written down.
Year-to-date tiers and true-ups adjusted. Interim quarters on a year-end true-up read zero by design.
Cumulative year-to-date tiers apply their retroactive uplift automatically, and annual true-ups against a second ladder are modelled as written.
Every zero explained as either a threshold missed or a data and scope fault.
Every result carries a written note, zeros included, and the ‘why is this $0’ view applies each rule in turn to name the one that empties the rebate.
The ‘why is this $0’ view: released to administrators first.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead the six silent causes of a $0 rebate
Comparison made period by period. A check covering three quarters set against a year-to-date total looks about right and proves nothing.
Each supplier payment is allocated across periods and programs, from a proposed split weighted by what each period earned, so earned and received are compared period by period.
Disputes opened in writing inside the contract’s window, with line-level detail attached.
The statement to the supplier sets out owed periods, held money and overcharge lines with invoice evidence, and the interpretation review quotes each clause with its page. People send them; the product does not file disputes.
The supplier statement and the interpretation review: released to administrators first.
Every check, electronic payment, credit memo and free-goods shipment matched to contract, term and period.
Each payment is recorded and allocated across periods and programs from a proposed split, and payments that name no contract wait in an allocations workbench until they are linked.
The allocations workbench: released to administrators first.
Unexplained receipts parked on a suspense list with an owner and a deadline, not applied until matched.
Cash that names no contract stays visible in the allocations workbench, and discrepancy reporting flags payments with no contract, or under- or over-allocated. Owners and deadlines are yours.
The allocations workbench: released to administrators first.
Overpayments investigated. They can mean purchases you cannot see, or a different scope on the supplier’s side.
Over-allocated payments are flagged, and the contract’s own page shows money received beyond what was due apart from what is still owed. Finding the cause is a person’s job.
Price credits and overcharge refunds kept out of rebate receipts.
Overcharges found by the price audits are reported as credit to recover, never booked as rebate.
Earned-not-received listed by supplier, contract and period, aged from each contract’s expected payment date.
Earned, received and pending report by supplier and contract, and a payment past its due date raises an overdue alert on the contract.
Write-offs supported by the supplier’s calculation, not by the passage of time.
The forfeiture register records money a supplier declined to pay, who declared it and where it is written down. It never edits what was earned, and it can be reversed.
Credits allocated to cost centers and facilities in proportion to their eligible purchases.
Earned, received and pending report by cost center and hospital, from the same results every other screen shows, and export for month end. The journal is yours.
Supplier rebates, group purchasing fee share-backs and local-agreement rebates kept in separate accounts.
Each contract carries its source, and received rebate is reported by GPO, local and distributor agreement. The accounts themselves live in your ledger.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead about three money flows behind one GL line
One folder per contract and period: terms in force, calculation file, purchase detail, supplier documentation, remittance, payment proof and dispute correspondence.
Contract documents store the agreement, amendments and exhibits with effective dates, and the analyst workbench exports the purchase rows behind a program. Remittances and correspondence stay in your own file.
Contract documents and the analyst workbench: released to administrators first.
Group purchasing organization’s annual written fee disclosure reconciled to share-backs received, when it arrives.
GPO and distributor admin fees are accrued from your own purchases and checked against the statement you are sent, and a variance raises an alert. Reconciling the annual disclosure is still your step.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead how to use the annual disclosure as a control total
Gap to next tier and current pace listed for each open period. Label it as pace, not a promise.
‘Next tier within reach’ and ‘period at risk’ alerts flag open periods on each contract, with the gap to the next tier. Pace is shown as arithmetic, never as a forecast.
How Rebate Recovery handles thisRead how to build the pace projection
Commitments running short assigned to category managers and service lines, with actions and dates.
Commitments going short are flagged while the period is open, with the rebate that depends on them, and tasks with an owner and a due date are assigned in Control Tower.
Control Tower: released to administrators first.
One page for the chief financial officer and supply chain leader: earned, received, booked, open disputes, dollars at risk, recoveries to date, and restatements of earlier periods with their cause.
The executive view puts received, earned, pending, missed and at risk for the year on one page, each figure with its formula. Booked amounts, disputes and restatements come from your own records.
Gaps that are policy or process
Software does not fix these. Each needs a decision, an owner or a routine. Where a product check sits next to one, the note says so.
Your last close measured as a baseline: working days from the end of the late-transaction window to sign-off, contracts in scope with all three figures, variances above tolerance with no logged cause, and suspense items past their deadline.
Your own measurement, taken before anything changes. Next quarter’s close, and any business case, are compared with it.
Contracts in scope listed: every agreement with a period ending this quarter, plus annual agreements whose accrual needs updating.
A scoping step in your routine. Earned, received and pending reports, rolled up by contract and quarter, give you a starting list.
Late invoices, credit notes and rebills dated in earlier periods listed. They belong to the period of their original date and will change a figure you already reported.
Listing them is a close step. When they load, the earlier period is recalculated from current data, so export the figures you sign off: the export is the record of what you approved.
Calculation file saved with the date and the data cut-off.
Your step. Figures are recalculated from current data and are not kept as snapshots, so save the export at sign-off. Reports export to Excel.
Supplier statement or calculation requested where none arrived.
Asking is a person’s job. The product does not contact suppliers.
Variances above tolerance logged with one cause each: data, tier, eligibility or timing.
The cause is a judgment for your team. Payment discrepancy alerts and the received discrepancy report give you the list to work through.
Bank reconciled by received date, earned reconciled by period date. Mixing the two produces false mismatches.
An accounting convention for your team. Allocating each payment to the periods it settles keeps earned by period apart from cash by date.
Past-due items escalated along an agreed path, with dates.
Escalation is your process. Alerts appear inside the product, not by email, and the product does not contact suppliers.
Periods approaching the contract’s claim or lookback limit flagged with the deadline.
A calendar step: put each contract’s claim or lookback deadline on the close calendar with an owner.
Accrual true-up journal prepared: the rebate on cumulative eligible purchases at the tier judged probable, less the amount accrued to date.
The journal is prepared in your general ledger; the product does not post entries. Earned and pending by contract are its inputs.
Tier judgment signed by supply chain, entry signed by accounting.
A sign-off control between two teams.
Figures exported as signed off. Late data will move them, and the export is the only record of what you approved.
Your step. Figures are recalculated from current data, and reports export to Excel for the file.
Want a second opinion on the gaps? Talk it through with us. Your answers stay on this page either way.
Where this is built in
Rebate Recovery builds many of these checks into the everyday work instead of a yearly audit. Checks every supplier rebate contract against what you actually bought, then shows what suppliers owe you today, what this period is on pace to pay, and what is still within reach before it closes.
What changed in version 1.1
- Grouped into phases, added a baseline step and the rule that a yes needs evidence, and made every item answerable on this page.