Reconciling proves that your books agree with your bank. Once a month, when the statement arrives, you tell SeroBooks the statement's date and ending balance, then tick every transaction in your books that appears on the statement. When the ticked transactions bring you exactly to the statement's ending balance — DIFFERENCE reads 0.00 — you sign the statement off. The ticked transactions are then locked to that reconciliation and do not appear the next month.
You can reconcile any account set up on the Bank Feeds screen: chequing, savings, credit cards and lines of credit. You do not need a bank feed or an imported statement; a paper or PDF statement is enough.
Before you start
- Enter everything for the month: cheques, deposits, card charges, transfers, bill payments. Anything missing will show as a difference.
- Have the statement in front of you: its closing date, its ending balance, and any bank fees or interest on it.
- If you have never reconciled this account, check that its opening balance matches the statement balance on the day your books start. The Beginning Balance comes from it.
Opening Begin Reconciliation
- Banking ▸ Reconcile
- Reconcile in the Banking panel of the Home Page
- Reconcile on an account's card on the Bank Feeds screen (Banking ▸ Bank Feeds), which opens the same questions in a window for that account.
Step 1: Begin Reconciliation
| Field | What to enter / what it means |
|---|---|
| Account | The bank or credit card account to reconcile. Under it, Last reconciled … shows the statement date of the last reconciliation. |
| Statement Date | The closing date printed on the statement. Only transactions dated on or before it are listed. |
| Beginning Balance | Filled in for you: the ending balance of the last reconciliation, or the account's opening balance if it has never been reconciled. It should match the opening balance on your statement. If it does not, stop and see Common problems. |
| Ending Balance | The closing balance printed on the statement, typed exactly. |
| Service Charge and Account | Any fee the bank charged on the statement that you have not entered, and the expense account for it. |
| Interest Earned and Account | Any interest the bank paid on the statement that you have not entered, and the income account for it. |
The service charge and interest are posted on the statement date, and only if you finish the reconciliation. If you leave without finishing, nothing is posted.
Three buttons under the account help before you begin:
- Import Statement… imports the bank's statement file for this account (see Bank Feeds).
- Locate Discrepancies and Undo Last Reconciliation open the account's reconciliation history, where you can open each past reconciliation's report and undo one. See Previous Reconciliation and undoing a reconciliation.
Choose Continue.
Step 2: Tick the transactions
The Reconcile window shows the account's name and statement date at the top, the Ending balance (which you can still correct), and the buttons Modify, Mark all and Unmark all. Below are two lists, named as the bank names them:
- Cheques and Payments — money that left the account: cheques, bill payments, card charges, transfers out, fees.
- Deposits and Other Credits — money that came in: deposits, transfers in, interest.
On a credit card account the lists follow the card: charges are the money going out of the card, and payments to the card are credits.
Each list shows DATE, REF, PAYEE (with the kind of transaction under the name) and AMOUNT, and at the top how many of its lines are ticked. Only transactions not yet signed off by an earlier reconciliation, dated on or before the statement date, are listed. Nothing outstanding means the list is empty.
- Work down the statement. For each item on it, click the matching line to tick it. Click again to untick it. Each tick is saved as you make it.
- Mark all ticks every line in both lists; Unmark all clears them all. Marking all and then unticking the few that are not on the statement is often quicker.
- Watch the summary at the bottom:
| Line | What it means |
|---|---|
| Beginning balance | Where the statement starts. |
| Cleared deposits · n | The total of the ticked deposits and how many. |
| Cleared payments · n | The total of the ticked cheques and payments, as a negative. |
| Service charge | The fee you entered at the start, as a negative. Shown only if you entered one. |
| Interest earned | The interest you entered at the start. Shown only if you entered some. |
| Cleared balance | Beginning balance plus everything above. |
| Ending balance | The statement's ending balance. |
| DIFFERENCE | Ending balance minus cleared balance. Red until it is zero; green at 0.00. |
Modify
Modify reopens the statement's figures without losing your ticks: Statement date, Ending balance, Service charge with its expense account (to expense) and Interest earned with its income account (to income). Choose Continue to go back to ticking. Changing the statement date reloads the lists, because which transactions belong depends on the date.
Step 3: Reconcile now
When DIFFERENCE reads 0.00, choose Reconcile now. SeroBooks asks Reconcile … ? and explains that the ticked transactions are locked to this reconciliation and drop out of the next one, and that undoing it later releases them again — nothing is deleted. Choose Reconcile now to sign off, or Not yet to keep working.
If the difference is not zero, Reconcile now says Difference must be 0.00 before you can reconcile. and keeps you where you are.
When it is done, SeroBooks confirms Reconciled — n line(s) signed off. and asks whether to Show the report of this reconciliation, to print or save it? Choose Summary or Detail to open that report (with a PDF button to print or save it), or Close.
What happens in the books
- The ticked transactions are marked cleared and tied to this reconciliation. They no longer appear when you reconcile the account again.
- If you entered a service charge, it is posted on the statement date: the expense account is debited and the bank account credited. Interest earned is posted the other way. Both are ticked automatically, because they are on the statement.
- The account's last reconciled date and balance are updated. The next reconciliation's Beginning Balance is this one's ending balance.
Nothing about the transactions themselves changes. A cleared transaction can still be opened and changed, but any change to its amount, or deleting it, means the reconciliation it was cleared in no longer adds up. (Deleting a cheque or card charge warns you of this.) Such changes show in Reconciliation Discrepancy.
Permissions
Ticking lines and completing a reconciliation need Reconcile. Undoing one needs Undo a Reconciliation.
Tips
- Reconcile every month, in order. A difference is far easier to find in one month than in six.
- Tick by amount: sort the statement by amount in your head, or tick the large items first, and the small differences stand out.
- A difference that is exactly the amount of one transaction usually means that transaction is missing from the books or was ticked by mistake. A difference that divides evenly by 9 often means two digits were swapped when the transaction was entered.
- If you use Undeposited Funds, make each deposit match one deposit on the statement; see Make Deposits.
Common problems
The Beginning Balance does not match the statement's opening balance. A transaction that was part of an earlier reconciliation has been changed, deleted or voided since, or an earlier reconciliation was undone. Open Reports ▸ Banking ▸ Reconciliation Discrepancy for this account to see what changed, and put it right before reconciling. See Reconciliation Discrepancy.
A transaction on the statement is not in the list. It has not been entered, it is dated after the statement date, it was entered against a different account, or it was cleared in an earlier reconciliation. Enter it or correct it, then use Modify or come back to the reconciliation.
The difference will not go to zero. Check the Ending balance you typed; check for a bank fee or interest you have not entered; check that every ticked line really is on the statement, and that the amounts match to the cent.
I signed off the wrong month or the wrong balance. Undo it from Previous Reconciliation and reconcile again.