Manual journal entry: overview

Use case overview

Despite advances in automation, enterprises continue to rely on manual journal entries to record adjustments, corrections, accruals, and other transactions that automated systems cannot fully address. Because MJEs directly impact the general ledger, they are typically subject to heightened review and approval requirements.

Even with these controls in place, manual journal entries remain a high-risk area due to their volume, complexity, and reliance on human judgment. Errors, duplicate postings, incorrect account coding, unauthorized activity, and inconsistent documentation can lead to misstatements, rework, and increased audit effort.

MindBridge enhances manual journal entry oversight by applying targeted analytics across general ledger data to identify unusual, high-risk, or inefficient entries. This includes detecting duplicate entries, reversals, unusual amounts or trends, unauthorized postings, incorrect accrual behavior, and recurring manual activity that may indicate process breakdowns. These insights help organizations streamline manual posting, reduce risk, and improve the accuracy and efficiency of financial reporting.

Key risks addressed

The manual journal entry use case helps identify and assess the following risk areas:

• Unusual or high-risk journal entries based on atypical users, accounts, transaction types, or amounts

• Duplicate journal entries that result in overstated expenses or misstated balances

• High volumes of reversals that indicate posting errors or downstream corrections

• Unauthorized journal entries that violate role-based or policy-based restrictions

• Incorrect account coding or unbalanced entries that impact financial statement accuracy

• Incorrect or inconsistent accrual activity that distorts period-based reporting

• Recurring manual entries that signal inefficiencies or opportunities for automation

• Insufficient review or approval of high-value journal entries