Roles and sign-off
Who prepares, who reviews, who signs.
Orion uses the four roles every Ferrata product uses: Owner, Admin, Approver and Viewer. On top of them, each task and reconciliation has a preparer and a reviewer, and each period has a sign-off order. Nobody signs what they prepared.
- Checks pass
- Controller
- CFO
- Locked
The roles
One role per person, across every product.
- Owner
- Sets up the company, its connections and external access, and can do anything an Admin can.
- Admin
- Manages the close template, thresholds, preparers, reviewers and the sign-off order.
- Approver
- Prepares, reviews and signs off the work assigned to them, and posts journals where your ERP allows.
- Viewer
- Reads what their record scope allows, and nothing else.
Segregation of duties
Two people on everything that counts.
Preparer and reviewer
Always two different people, on every task and reconciliation.
Sign-off order
The people who sign a period, in the order your company sets.
Record scope
A person sees the customers, vendors and companies their role covers; the books as a whole go to roles that cover every record.
Reopen
Only a named role reopens a locked period, with a reason.
A reconciliation, signed
From prepared to locked.
- 01
Prepared
By the preparer, with the evidence attached.
- 02
Reviewed
By someone else, who signs with what they saw.
- 03
Period signed
By the people in your sign-off order.
- 04
Locked
Read-only, with every signature kept.
What Orion works out, and what is yours
Orion does the arithmetic. People sign.
Orion enforces who may do what on its own. Who holds each role is your company's decision.
Orion matches, ties and calculates on its own, from the records already in your foundation. Every journal posted, every difference written off, every reconciliation signed off and every period locked is a person's decision, recorded with their name. Orion never moves money.
Orion works it out
- Stops anyone signing what they prepared
- Enforces record scope on every page
- Keeps every signature with the period
Always a person
- Who holds each role
- The sign-off order
- Reopening a locked period
FAQ
Roles and sign-off, run end to end.
Which roles does Orion use?
The four every Ferrata product uses: Owner, Admin, Approver and Viewer, one per person per company. Preparers and reviewers are assigned per task and per reconciliation on top of them.
Can one person prepare and review the same reconciliation?
No. Orion stops a person signing anything they prepared, in the checklist and in the reconciliations, and records both signatures.
Who decides the sign-off order for a period?
Your company, at onboarding: usually the controller, then the CFO. An Admin can change it, and the change is recorded.
Can we limit what someone sees?
Yes. Record scope limits a person to the customers, vendors and companies you choose, as in every Ferrata product. The close itself is the company's books as a whole, so it goes to roles that cover every record.
Are these the same roles as in Atlas, Apex and Cortex?
Yes. A person has one role per company across every Ferrata product, so a controller who approves in Cortex is an Approver in Orion too.
Related in Orion
- Period close and sign-offA period closes when the checks pass and the people your company names sign it, and then it is locked.View
- Your data stays yoursYour ledger, bank lines and payroll in your company's own database, with an append-only record of every change.View
- Month-end closeThe close checklist and every task by period, with its owner, its status and the evidence behind it.View
- ReconciliationsBank, balance sheet and intercompany reconciliations in one workspace, each with its preparer, reviewer and evidence.View
See Orion work on your own close.
Bring last month's close: the checklist, the reconciliations and the trial balance. We run it through Orion beside your team and show you where it would have tied, and give you an honest answer if the close is slow for a reason upstream that you should fix first.
Your close calendar, chart of accounts, thresholds, reviewers and sign-off order are yours, and they stay yours. Orion is configured to the way your team closes. You are not handing over a playbook or fitting into a template.