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bank reconciliation

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Help! I can't get my checking account to balance. I have completed all the steps in the help articles and nothing works. I have started over 3 times. Beginning and ending balances are correct. Any suggestions for how to find it?

QuickBooks Desktop

FishingForAnswersAnswer

@ImaBassetcase If the beginning balance is correct, and the ending balance is correct, then short of the program itself being significantly corrupted, the difference has to be in either your deposits, or your expenses.

Unfortunately, nobody here is likely to be able to provide much more advice than 'go through each item you are checking off individually and pay close attention for incorrect amounts in QuickBooks, compared to your bank statement'.

One of those amounts is certainly wrong, if your starting and ending balances are correct, and that's pretty much all that can be said about it.

FishingForAnswersAnswer

@ImaBassetcase If the beginning balance is correct, and the ending balance is correct, then short of the program itself being significantly corrupted, the difference has to be in either your deposits, or your expenses.

Unfortunately, nobody here is likely to be able to provide much more advice than 'go through each item you are checking off individually and pay close attention for incorrect amounts in QuickBooks, compared to your bank statement'.

One of those amounts is certainly wrong, if your starting and ending balances are correct, and that's pretty much all that can be said about it.

BigRedConsulting

RE: Beginning and ending balances are correct.

The formula is:

Beginning balance + Deposits - Payments = Ending Balance.

So, if the beginning balance matches the bank statement, then if your total payments and total deposits match, then you're done as the ending balance will then match. (Some bank statements include a total for each of these things.)

Find the differences by de-selecting everything and then using the bank statement, select the matching transactions in reconcile one at a time, and mark the paper statement's transaction as matched/selected. You'll eventually find what is missing or different in your books compared to the bank statement. Then fix that and then continue reconciling until everything matches.

I

ImaBassetcaseAuthor

Thanks ya'll. I have done it three times and I know there is an issue somewhere, but I will keep trying. There are two expenses showing up from past statements that were cleared, but are showing up as uncleared when I do the current reconciliation. If I mark them it still is off, so I don't think that is the issue. I made a journal entry in the amount of those two transactions last month due to the beginning balance being incorrect last month. It was apparently due to those two not marked as cleared - although they did show up on the bank statement, and there were not duplicate entries. Gee, I will start over again tomorrow.

BigRedConsulting

RE: There are two expenses showing up from past statements that were cleared, but are showing up as uncleared when I do the current reconciliation. If I mark them it still is off, so I don't think that is the issue.

Well... if transactions that did clear on prior statements show as uncleared, then your QuickBooks reconcile opening balance should not be correct /should not match your bank statement opening balance.

If your QuickBooks reconcile opening balance does match your bank statement, even though those transactions are uncleared (unless they add up to 0.00), then they must not have actually cleared before.

If the opening balance if off by the sum of the prior transactions, then perform a mini-reconcile where you enter ending balance amount = your bank statement opening balance. Then when you're done with that reconcile and start again, the opening balance in QuickBooks will match your bank statement's opening balance. Then you can proceed as previously recommended with an accurate starting point.

RE: I made a journal entry in the amount of those two transactions last month due to the beginning balance being incorrect last month.

Generally, if you want reconciliations to work, don't record anything in your bank account in QuickBooks that didn't happen in the real world. If you are off, fix it, don't just enter adjustments or let QuickBooks enter adjustments to make the reconcile work. In my experience that is almost always a bad idea and creates more problems in the future. Better to fix it now. IMO there is no reason why an adjustment should be needed. Instead, just make sure your books reflect the real world and then your accounts will balance.

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