Where the settings are
Open Accounting → Configuration → Settings and scroll to Inventory Valuation, right after Default Accounts. The block holds the defaults for the current company:
- Valuation: Periodic (at closing), the default, or Perpetual (at invoicing).
- Cost Method: Standard Price or Average Cost (AVCO), plus First In First Out (FIFO) once Inventory is installed.
- Periodic Valuation: whether the closing entry is made by hand, every day or at the end of each month.
- Stock Valuation Account and the Journal the valuation entries are posted to.
Each product category can override these on its Accounting tab (Inventory → Configuration → Products → Product Categories): valuation, costing method, stock account, stock variation account and, where standard cost meets perpetual valuation, the price difference account. Locations of type Inventory Loss and Production can carry accounts of their own.
Why the block can be missing
- Only Invoicing is installed. The Inventory Valuation block comes with the Accounting app of Odoo 20 Enterprise. With Invoicing alone, or on Odoo Community, there is no block: the valuation fields are on each product category’s Accounting tab.
- FIFO is not offered. FIFO comes with the WMS Accounting module (
stock_account), which Odoo installs by itself when Inventory and Invoicing are both present. If a database lost it during testing, install it again from Apps. - The Accounting tab is hidden on categories. It is shown to users with accounting access: the group Show Accounting Features - Readonly or above.
- Another company is active. The settings are per company, so switch company in the top bar first.
Periodic or perpetual in Odoo 20
Periodic (at closing) values the stock at a closing date and posts one closing entry, either when you run the closing yourself or automatically every day or at month end, as the Periodic Valuation setting says.
Perpetual (at invoicing) creates the valuation entries automatically when products are billed or invoiced.
Before you change anything on a live database
- Agree the valuation mode and the cut-over date with your accountant first.
- Set the costing method on each product category. Changing it later revalues that category’s products from the last closing date.
- Changing the company’s cost method revalues every storable product that follows the company default, also from the last closing date.
- Check the stock valuation account on each category, and the price difference account wherever standard cost meets perpetual valuation.
Moving a company from Odoo 19 to Odoo 20, or from periodic to perpetual in the middle of a year, needs a plan for the opening balances. That is migration work we do for clients in Kuwait and the GCC.