Before I knew there was a specific setting for bank and cash accounts I created GL accounts for several bank accounts. I now have dozens of transactions in these accounts, but I have had to reconcile them by hand. I just discovered the ability to set up reconcilable bank accounts, but I do not want to have to redo all the previously entered transactions. Is there some way to convert the previously created accounts to “bank accounts”?
Welcome to the forum @dmpaul
You should go to Bank and Cash Accounts > Edit the account in question and check the box that says Can have pending transactions
@dmpaul, I think @Ealfardan may have misunderstood your problem. If I understand correctly, you did not create your bank accounts as either cash or bank accounts, but as ordinary ledger accounts. So his remedy will not work. (It converts a cash account into a bank account.)
The question is how did you enter transactions? You cannot have used either the Receipts or Payments tabs, because they require cash or bank accounts to be defined first. So how did you enter these transactions?
Regrettably, you apparently launched into using Manager without reading any of the Guides for instructions. You may have no choice but to start over. But the complete answer will depend on exactly how you entered these transactions.
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For that task I would
- Back up your manager data file (in case things go backwards)
- Enabling bank accounts, receipts, payments & reconciliation tabs
- Add Manager Bank accounts
- Manually edit the dozens of transaction to use bank accounts, receipts & payments
- Delete the now unused GL accounts
Depending on how the transactions were entered, editing them to use bank accounts, receipts & payments may be impossible. That’s why it is important to know what was done.
You are correct.
I should have said
- Manually Re-enter the dozens of transaction to use bank accounts, receipts & payments. Deleting the old transaction as each is done".
- Find and recode or batch update could be also considered but I suspect for that number of transactions direct manual correction is probably faster.
I considered that, too. But that will also depend on how the transactions were entered.
Another recovery approach could be to import bank statements after proper setup, followed by batch deletion of the existing transactions.
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Thank you, Tut and Patch. I should have investigated further before I started. I assumed that free GL software would be rudimentary. Serious mistake on my part. There are over 200 entries across five accounts that would need to be recoded. I’m stuck with what I have.
Maybe it’s time you tried Batch operations. This will make quick work of copying whatever journal entries to Receipts/Payments.
Refer to this guide for more details:
@dmpaul, you basically need to start over regardless. Believe me, though, 200 entries is not as daunting as you may think. If you plan to continue with Manager, you have no choice but to use the program correctly. There are lots of features and tools in the program to streamline the process. That is why it is so important to tell us how your existing entries were made. If you are unwilling to do that, you will get no help.
I assure you, I could have re-entered 200 transactions in a number of ways—copying, cloning, recurring transactions, batch operations—in the time that has been wasted trying to find out what you did and speculating about solutions.
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Manual entry would probably take 3 hours, so not actually that long.
The best solution Imo as it will save you lots of time going forward, and probably take less than 3 hours to correct the current data.