Transfer Funds records money moving between accounts the business already holds: from chequing to savings, from the bank to petty cash, from the bank to pay off the company credit card. Nothing is earned or spent, so no income or expense account is touched — one account goes down and the other goes up by the same amount.
Opening Transfer Funds
- Banking ▸ Transfer Funds
- Transfer Funds in the Banking panel of the Home Page
- Transfer on the Bank Feeds screen opens a shorter version of the same form in a window. See Bank Feeds.
Transfer money, step by step
- Set the Date of the transfer — the day the money moved.
- In Transfer Funds From, choose the account the money leaves. Its Account Balance appears beside it.
- In Transfer Funds To, choose the account the money goes to. Its balance appears beside it too.
- Type the Transfer Amount.
- Type a Memo if you want one. With no memo, the entry is described as a transfer from one account to the other.
- Choose Save & Close, or Save & New to record another transfer.
SeroBooks confirms, for example, $500.00 transferred from Chequing to Savings.
The fields
| Field | What to enter / what it means |
|---|---|
| Date | The date of the transfer. |
| Transfer Funds From | The account the money comes out of. The list holds your bank, cash and credit card accounts. |
| Account Balance | That account's balance now, on the books. For checking only. |
| Transfer Funds To | The account the money goes into. |
| Transfer Amount | How much moved. |
| Memo | A note for the transfer. |
What happens in the books
One entry: the To account is debited and the From account is credited with the amount.
- Bank to bank: one balance goes down, the other up.
- Bank to credit card (paying the card): the bank goes down and the amount owed on the card goes down.
- Bank to petty cash: the bank goes down and the cash account goes up.
The transfer appears in both accounts' registers and in both accounts' reconcile windows.
Permissions
A transfer is written as a journal entry, so the role needs Post Journal Entry.
Messages you may see
| Message | What to do |
|---|---|
| A transfer needs two bank, cash or credit card accounts in the Chart of Accounts. This business has 1. | Create a second bank, cash or card account first. |
| Choose the account the money leaves and the one it goes to. | Fill in both accounts. |
| Money cannot move to the account it came from. | The From and To accounts are the same. |
| Enter the amount transferred. | Type an amount greater than zero. |
| "…" is a … account. A transfer moves money between accounts the business holds — bank, cash, or a card or loan it owes. | You chose an income, expense or equity account. Use another form for that money. |
If the date is on or before the closing date, the transfer is refused. See Set Closing Date and Year-End.
Tips
- Pay the company credit card with a transfer from the bank to the card account, or with a cheque written to the card company against the card account. Either way the card's balance goes down.
- When the bank feed brings in both sides of a transfer between two of your accounts, the matching on the Bank Feeds review screen can recognise it as a transfer instead of two separate transactions.