A five-person Tunisian PME—owner, one salesperson, one operations lead, one finance/admin hire, and an external expert-comptable—can go live on Hesabi in about four weeks if onboarding is sequenced deliberately. Rushing TTN clearance before chart of accounts and roles are stable creates rework; waiting months to migrate spreadsheets means you pay twice during parallel-run.
This case-study-style FAQ walks week by week through what we see work for micro-PMEs adopting hesabi.tn: fiscal master data, a controlled TTN test, role separation, and a clean accountant handoff. It is operational guidance, not binding tax advice—your cabinet confirms declaration authority and TEJ treatment.
Week 0: align before you click anything
- Name an internal owner (usually finance/admin) and a backup (often the owner)
- Confirm TTN enrollment status and digital certificate lead time—see ttn-el-fatoora-sme-guide for prerequisites
- Book a 60-minute kickoff with your expert-comptable to agree export format and review cadence
- List open invoices, unpaid supplier bills, and bank balances you will carry into go-live
Five people means everyone wears two hats. Write a one-page RACI for invoice draft, TTN clearance, payments, and exports—ambiguity causes duplicate customers and uncorrected drafts.
Week 1: company shell and chart of accounts
Create the company profile with legal name, matricule fiscal, address, and default currency TND. Import or configure the chart of accounts with your accountant—not from a generic template copied off the internet. Tunisian PMEs often need distinct revenue lines per activity, proper TVA collectée and déductible mapping, and withholding buckets your cabinet uses for TEJ exports.
Lock the chart before loading historical balances. Renaming accounts after transactions exist is painful—when unsure between two codes, let your expert-comptable decide and document it.
Week 1 (continued): users and roles
- Owner: admin plus approval on sensitive settings; avoid daily invoice entry
- Sales: customer create and draft invoices only—no TTN signing credentials on shared laptops
- Finance/admin: clearance submission, payment recording, exports, bank reconciliation
- Accountant: read or export access per engagement—never shared owner passwords over WhatsApp
Role design matters more than feature training. Sales should not finalize cleared invoices without finance review; accountants should not use owner credentials. Mirror week-0 RACI in Hesabi roles.
Week 2: master data and opening balances
Load customers and suppliers with validated tax IDs. Build a compact catalog with correct TVA rates. Import opening balances per your accountant's cutover date and reconcile to last year's closing before new invoices go out.
Run three internal practice invoices—standard 19% TVA, one exempt line if applicable, and a credit note—without TTN submission. Catch wrong journals while rollback is still trivial.
Week 3: TTN test and parallel run
- Certificate check
Confirm signing certificate installed and expiry logged on a shared calendar 30 days ahead.
- Sandbox or low-risk live test
Issue one real cleared invoice to an understanding client or internal test customer; store TTN reference and QR metadata.
- Failure drill
Simulate a rejected clearance—wrong buyer ID—and verify finance can correct without retyping from WhatsApp PDFs.
- Parallel run
For the rest of week 3, mirror every customer invoice in old process and Hesabi; variances must be explainable daily.
TTN test week is not optional. Teams that skip it discover numbering gaps when a corporate client rejects the document. Hesabi should be the system of record—not a side copy alongside spreadsheets.
Week 4: accountant handoff and first close
Export the first production month per accountant-hesabi-workflow: cleared register, balances, TEJ lines, and credit notes. Review with the cabinet within five business days—not at declaration deadline.
- Finance locks the period; no backdated drafts without accountant visibility
- Cabinet validates TVA totals and flags missing attachments
- Adjustments happen inside Hesabi with audit log—not shadow spreadsheets
- Owner signs off that parallel run ends and legacy tool is read-only
Common mistakes for five-person Tunis PMEs
- Copying a foreign ERP chart of accounts that does not map to TEJ and TVA exports
- Granting TTN signing rights to every salesperson for speed
- Skipping opening balance reconciliation to hit an arbitrary go-live Friday
- Treating accountant exports as ad hoc WeTransfer instead of a fixed monthly rhythm
- Ignoring certificate renewal until the first clearance failure in peak season
- Running Hesabi alongside unlimited shadow Excel without a parallel-run end date
After go-live, hold a 30-minute weekly ops review for two months and keep one runbook link updated when TTN rules change. Measure draft-to-clearance lead time so informal PDFs do not creep back. Start at hesabi.tn; product billing stays there—not on marketing lists.
Can a five-person company finish onboarding faster than four weeks?
Yes, if TTN enrollment and certificates are already live and your accountant co-builds the chart in week 1. Never skip the TTN test or parallel-run windows.
Who should own the chart of accounts?
Jointly: the PME finance lead creates structure; the expert-comptable validates mapping to declarations and TEJ. Owner approves breaking changes after go-live.
What belongs in the TTN test week?
One cleared invoice, one correction path, and verified TTN references on cabinet exports. Label test customers in master data.
How do we hand off to the accountant without sharing owner passwords?
Use export-only or cabinet access per accountant-hesabi-workflow. Agree format and calendar before opening balances import.
Which subscription tier fits a five-person PME?
Most single-entity PMEs with payroll and comptabilité needs land on Pro; micro-structures with invoicing only may start on Starter. Confirm current limits on hesabi.tn before purchase.
