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- Small Business Accounting
- Features
- Bank reconciliation
Bank reconciliation
Explain the difference between bank activity and posted books. A statement closing balance may differ from the books because a customer deposit has not reached the bank or a supplier check has not cleared. Identify those timing items explicitly. Deposits in transit increase the adjusted statement balance and outstanding checks reduce it; they should not be reversed merely to force the comparison to agree.
OverviewUnreconciled Bank Transactions×
Small Business Accounting · Bank reconciliation
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Unreconciled Bank Transactions
Bank transactions
| Bank account | Transaction date | Description | Counterparty | Amount | Status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tax reserve savings, ending 1944 | 13 Oct | Monthly rent for workshop | Juniper Lane Bakery | 890 | Unmatched | |
| Equipment reserve, ending 3058 | 18 Oct | Customer payment on April invoice | Northbank Office Supply | 390 | Unmatched | |
| Petty cash drawer | 16 Oct | Supplier bill for packaging | Willowbrook Cleaning Co. | 340 | Unmatched | |
| Tax reserve savings, ending 1944 | 12 Oct | Payroll funding transfer | Tidal Ridge Couriers | 870 | Unmatched | |
| Merchant settlement, ending 6620 | 10 Oct | Bank fee for outgoing wire | Crescent Mill Carpentry | 770 | Unmatched |
6 of 6 records
Monthly rent for workshopBank transactions · BT-91025
UnmatchedBank accountTax reserve savings, ending 1944
Transaction date13 Oct
CounterpartyJuniper Lane Bakery
Amount890
What you can do
Keep the business context together
Import bank statements with the account, date range, opening balance and closing balance. Each bank transaction retains an external identifier or a checked import identity. Match the bank event with the appropriate receipt, payment or journal while keeping the original statement row available for investigation.
A bank fee shown on the statement may be missing from the ledger. Prepare the authorized fee entry in the local general ledger, post it through the permitted accounting process and then compare the adjusted book balance again. Labeling the fee as matched without its actual book entry would leave the financial statements incomplete.
Give each decision a clear owner
The preparer resolves unmatched rows and records outstanding checks or deposits in transit. Controller / CFO reviews the reconciliation independently. Approved reconciliation requires the adjusted statement balance to agree with posted books after any authorized bank fee or interest entries have been posted.
Bank rows retain their import identity, account and statement period. Reimporting a file should identify the same row instead of adding another transaction. A match consumes only the permitted source amount, and a bank row cannot be reused against another payment just because both payments share a date or a similar description.
Handle exceptions with the original record
Do not match an amount across the wrong bank account, entity or currency. A reused statement row cannot settle another transaction. Reopening a reconciliation preserves the previous decision and requires a reason; an unexplained difference cannot disappear by changing a status label.
The reconciliation reviewer sees the statement balance, timing differences, posted adjustments and remaining difference together. The adjusted statement and adjusted book balances must agree before approval. A nonzero difference stays visible with its explanation; changing the reconciliation status cannot supply a missing receipt or erase a duplicated payment.
Find the work that needs attention
Use Unreconciled Bank Transactions to investigate unmatched descriptions, counterparty references and amounts. Resolve the account and currency before searching for a candidate payment. A receipt in another entity or a different currency requires its own supported accounting treatment rather than an unrestricted match across the entire business.
Configure it around your business
Configure statement formats and account mappings using a complete statement period. Include an outstanding check, a deposit in transit and a posted bank fee in the reconciliation review. Preserve the opening and closing balances so the next month starts from an explainable position, including when an authorized user later reopens a prior reconciliation.
What your team sees
- Unreconciled Bank Transactions — Review the work and supporting records for this module.
What it keeps track of
Data model- Bank accounts
- The firm’s bank, credit-card, and cash accounts. Each maps to one GL account and can take a bank feed.
- Bank statements
- Imported bank statements for reconciling a bank account to the GL.
- Bank transactions
- Individual bank lines — inbound receipts, outbound payments, fees — matched to
PaymentsReceived/PaymentsMadeor posted as direct JEs (fees, interest). - Bank reconciliations
- Matches a statement to GL bank activity for a period.
- Payments received
- Customer receipts applied against one or more invoices.
- Receipt allocations
- Amount-bearing allocations of one confirmed customer receipt across permitted invoices.
- Payments made
- One vendor-bill payment or one approved employee-claim reimbursement. Pay run ID groups separate payment records; it does not make one payment belong to several bills or mixed payees.
- Journal entries
- GL journal entries — manual, subledger-auto-posted, or reversing. State:
Draft → Posted → Reversed.
Who uses it
Permissions- AP Clerk
- AP Clerk works within the record, field and action scope below.
- AR Clerk
- AR Clerk works within the record, field and action scope below.
- Controller / CFO
- Controller / CFO works within the record, field and action scope below.
Set up Small Business Accounting your way.
Start free, then use Proto to change fields, steps and approvals before your team goes live.