Copilot can now draft journal entries. The audit trail is still optional

Facts are attributed and linked to their sources. The analysis and opinions are the author's own.

What it is

On 29 October Microsoft launched Copilot for finance, a set of more than 25 new finance skills and plugins. The accounting skills cover work such as account reconciliations and preparing journal entries, and are available through Microsoft's Frontier early-access programme. A Capital Markets plugin and a Finance plugin in Cowork are generally available. Data and software partners include Moody's, Fitch Solutions, S&P Global, LSEG, FactSet, Morningstar, Intuit QuickBooks, Xero and Mercury.

Microsoft says that in seven days of access for Insiders, more than 8,000 users invoked the accounting skills more than 44,000 times across more than 18,000 conversations. In Excel, users get "the option to start an audit trail" when they invoke an accounting capability. Excel's history feature also lets Copilot selectively reverse individual edits.

Why it matters

A journal entry is a control point. Finance teams built segregation of duties and maker-checker review around it because entries move numbers that end up in the published accounts. When Copilot drafts an accrual, it is the maker. In my view the record of what it changed, and why, should be on by default and stored where auditors already look. It should not be an option the user has to remember, kept in chat history.

In accounting, a record you have to remember to switch on is not an audit trail. It is a diary.

The usage numbers point the same way. Forty-four thousand invocations in a week of limited access suggest adoption will move faster than policy. The partner list matters too. Credit ratings, market data and ledger data now sit in the same session, under different licences and different entitlements. Before switching this on, a controller should ask three things. Can an administrator enforce the audit trail? Does the record export to the ledger or the working papers? And who reviews AI-prepared entries above a threshold?

What I'd watch

• Whether Microsoft lets administrators make the audit trail mandatory.
• How external auditors treat entries prepared by Copilot during year-end audits.
• Whether the accounting skills leave the Frontier programme, and on what terms.