Reconciliation for restaurants, supermarkets and multi-branch businesses in Nigeria

A multi-branch business should reconcile POS settlements and counter transfers daily, cash and imprest weekly, and every bank and clearing account monthly, using the same structure in every branch. That rhythm catches short settlements, fake transfers and cash gaps while they can still be recovered.

With one outlet, an owner can keep the day in their head. With twelve branches, nobody can, and small gaps add up to real money.

Why it has become harder

POS transactions were worth ₦41.74trn in the first half of 2026, up 62.5% on a year earlier, according to FDC analysis of NIBSS data reported by New Telegraph (checked November 2026). That means more terminals, often from several providers, settling into several banks. Example figures: eight branches with three terminals each give 24 settlements to check every working day.

Where money goes missing between till and bank

• POS settlements. A terminal settles short, a fee is above your agreement, a day's settlement never arrives, or a terminal settles into the wrong account. The CBN Guidelines on Operations of Electronic Payment Channels (2020) require domestic POS transactions to settle to merchants on T+1 and set a 48-hour window for POS disputes. Check your acquirer agreement for the window that applies to you.
• Sales records. A card sale recorded as cash, or the reverse, balances overall while both lines are wrong.
• Transfers and fake alerts. Staff release goods on an SMS or screenshot; see how to detect fake bank alerts.
• Cash. The till count disagrees with the sales record, or cash sits in a branch for days before it is lodged.
• Imprest. Top-ups approved without receipts become expenses nobody reviewed.
• Unbooked charges. From 1 January 2026 the ₦50 EMTL was replaced by a ₦50 stamp duty paid by the sender on transfers of ₦10,000 and above, according to PwC Tax Summaries (checked November 2026). Unbooked, they make bank and ledger drift apart. Confirm the rules that apply to you with your tax adviser.

What to reconcile daily, weekly and monthly

How to organise it branch by branch

1. Name things consistently. Give each terminal a branch reference, such as "IKJ-T2" for Ikeja terminal 2, and use it in the ledger and the reconciliation.
2. Use a POS clearing account. Post card sales to it on the day and clear it when the settlement arrives. What's left is unsettled money with a known terminal and day.
3. Give every branch an owner. The branch manager prepares the cash count and imprest; head office reviews. Nobody approves their own count.
4. Handle cut-off on purpose. A card sale on 31 October that settles on 1 November is a timing item, not a difference.

Example figures: Lekki branch, terminal 2, Tuesday 14 October. The sales record and the terminal report both show ₦412,500 over 37 transactions. On Wednesday ₦398,900 arrives. The fee on your agreement is ₦2,100, so you expected ₦410,400. The ₦11,500 gap matches one approved transaction that never settled. Raised that morning, it is a phone call to your acquirer. Found at month-end, it is often lost. See also how to reconcile POS transactions.

How Brillrec helps

Brillrec is the finance operations platform for Nigerian businesses, with three products: Reconciliation, Internal Control Automation and Financial Close Management.

• Daily reconciliations on Essential and above, so each branch's gaps show the next morning. Accounts linked to an accounting system and a bank feed are also reconciled month-to-date each morning, with a short summary emailed.
• POS money matched to the bank daily. Moniepoint POS exports are recognised by name, other reports are read by their columns, and declined payments are left out and counted. For bank POS, Brillrec checks that each day's net amount reached the bank. Fees are recomputed for Paystack, Flutterwave, Monnify and Squad, and for any processor whose agreed rate you enter. See POS money.
• Statements and transfers. Statements are read in the layout the bank sends, and transfers are matched by reference, NIP session ID, amount and date. See Reconciliation.
• POS clearing and cash in transit accounts on Professional and above. Every item is matched, or aged and owned, and the account signs off only when it nets to nil or every item is explained.
• Bank charges, stamp duty and NIP charges found and explained in one step, then sent to the journal export.
• Cash counts in Reconciliation, on Essential and above: petty cash, imprest and tills counted note by note, signed by the custodian and reviewed by someone else, with the top-up worked out.
• Owners per branch. Each account can have a usual preparer, items can be assigned to a person, and comments with @mentions email the person named.
• Review from anywhere. Sign-off can require a reviewer who is not the preparer, and segregation of duties is checked. Reviewers can approve, send back with a note or sign off from a phone under "Waiting for me". Reopening needs a reason and is logged, and each reconciliation gets a PDF sign-off pack. See Internal Control Automation.
• Close checklists with owners, reviewers and due dates: 10 active checklists on Essential, unlimited on Professional and above.
• Head-office view. The Reports page shows a month-end close tracker by account and open items by age, with CSV downloads. The owner's month-end report in Financial Close Management gives cash by account, money found, reconciliations signed off and tax due next month.

What a branch costs. Essential, at ₦75,000 a month plus VAT, has unlimited accounts and users, so a new branch adds no user or account fee. It includes 10,000 records a month (then ₦20,000 per started 10,000) and 10 bank feeds; Professional, at ₦350,000, has 50,000 records and 30 feeds. See pricing.

Reported by clients: 99% of clients' bank and ledger lines matched automatically in a month, 70% less month-end close time, 50% less audit preparation time and 2.5x finance team productivity. Results depend on your records and how your team works. See client results.

Frequently asked questions

How do I reconcile POS across several branches?

Give each terminal a branch reference, post card sales to a POS clearing account, and match each terminal's daily sales to the next working day's bank credit.

What should I do if a POS settlement is short?

Compare the terminal report, the bank credit and the fee on your agreement. Raise any approved but unsettled transaction with your acquirer the same day, with the terminal ID, date, time and amount.

How should we manage imprest across branches?

Set a fixed float per branch, approve top-ups only against receipts, and count the float weekly. The person who spends it shouldn't approve its top-up.

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