Reconciling Distant Credit Card Balances

1

Hi. Hope you can help.

I have a credit card account with entries dating back to 2013 with payment transfers linked to a current account that extends back to the same period. The current account has always been reconciled.

I haven’t got statements for the credit card dating that far back. I’d like to start reconciling more recent statements for my credit card, say from 2015.

The problem is:

  1. If I try to prepare a report for a more current date, MM always throws me back to 2013 and wants to start reconciling from that date onwards. I don’t have statements that far back, so can’t reconcile forward even if I wanted to.
  2. My recent statements do not show a running balance, so I can only enter starting and finishing balances for that statement period.

Can I enter something within MM to adjust the account and be able to reconcile forward from a date when I do have statements, ie start from a fresh point??

Many thanks for a great accounting system and for any help you are able to offer.

2

When doing the reconciling are you entering the balance with a minus (-) sign in front, assuming you owe money on the Credit Card ?

3

Thanks for your suggestion, as well as replying quickly. It doesn’t solve my problem though. I don’t think it is a problem of positive v negative.

Even if I assume all transactions correct, MM laboriously asks me to enter a balance nearly every day onwards from 2013.

An answer for me would be able to reconcile from a date -to a date, ie enter a balance at start and finish, with a disregard for anything before or afterwards ( I think!).

Kind regards

4

Yes it can be - Manager can’t reconcile a negative BS account balance to a positively entered reconcile figure’

Does your edition of Manager have the Bank Reconciliations feature under the Reports tab, if yes, that’s good. Otherwise you are on an old edition and you should update.

Can I suggest that you delete all existing Credit Card BR reports just in case there are some data issues.
Go to Reports - Bank Reconciliations - click edit next to the CC report, scroll to the bottom and click delete.
Hopefully there should only be the one report - if there are others - delete also.

Option 1
With your latest CC statement handy, go to your Cash Accounts tab, click on the Credit Card balance - Using the date from your CCS go to a transaction with a date just prior - if the CCS is May 31, then the last transaction in May - record the balance next to that transaction - all things being equal it should equal the CCS balance - if the balance is in red then its a negative figure.

If the balances don’t match then this could be the start of your problem - go to Option 2

Now go to the Reports - BR - click new report - enter the Statement date - select the CC - and click Create.
Click on View next to the CC listing and enter the balance, with minus if applicable, click Update and the Reconciliation Report will appear.

Option 2
If your CCS and Manager account balances aren’t equal then there is a data mismatch which needs to be sorted. Calculate the difference the two balances and record it.

You mentioned above that you want to reconcile from 2015, so go to your earliest statement of 2015 and note the starting date and opening balance. Go to your Cash Accounts tab, click on the Credit Card balance - Using that date from your CCS go to a transaction with a date just prior - if the CCS is Jan1, then the last transaction in Dec - record the balance next to that transaction - does this equal the opening balance - if not, is it the same balance variation as before?

If its the same variation then that needs to be fixed, if its a different variation then there is a mismatch of data both before and after Jan 1, 2015. Regardless of the variation situation until there is a matching balance between the CCS and the Manager CC account - you will “never” be able to reconcile,

You can’t, as you suggest, just pick a starting date/balance and commence reconciling from there as that only hides the flaw rather then resolving it.

So you could either requests copies of the missing statements from 2013 or as at Dec 31, 2014 post an adjusting transaction equal to the Jan 1 variation. Then do a reconciliation as at Dec 31, 2014. Then complete all subsequent reconciliations in alignment with CCS dates & balances

5

@muffin, the problem you describe reminds me of difficulties I had many versions ago when there was a reconciliation assistant. That routine no longer exists. So please do follow @Brucanna’s advice to make sure your software is up to date.

Beyond that, though, you may be the victim of a partially complete reconciliation process for which there is no exit. Things should not be that complex anymore. As I understand the current implementation, Manager now should only look to reconcile things since the last reconciliation was performed. So, if you haven’t, delete all existing reconciliation statements. They are just reports now, and can easily be regenerated.

Then create a new reconciliation statement for the most recent date on which you knew the status of your credit card account. This might be the most recent statement date. Or it might be after a quiet period when you made no charges to the card. It would be helpful if there were no uncleared deposits or payments, but not essential.

View the statement, which should bring up a box into which to enter the account balance on that date. If it’s a credit card, that balance should normally be negative. If numbers agree, you should see a satisfactory reconciliation report. If there are uncleared deposits or payments, the statement should list those.

An important point is that you don’t need to somehow recreate reconciliation statements from the past. If the balance you enter matches your statement balance, you will be reconciled as of a very recent date. Since you ran your business from 2013 onwards without reconciliation statements, why try to recreate them now? A current reconciliation encompasses your entire history.

6

Hi Brucanna and Tut

I’m so grateful for such detailed replies and helpful suggestions to my problem from you both. I’ll give them all a go and report back. I hope my problem and your solutions add to the knowledge base for MM, as I more fully understand some of what’s going on ‘under the bonnet’ of MM now.

Many thanks

Muffin

7

Hi Guys

Tried everything suggested: deleting old report, creating new one with recent date and balance, but after entering the balance MM always takes me back to 2013 ie it always wants to start the reconciling process from 2013.

I guess there is no easy solution here. I’ve always import my CC statements into MM and manually checked each transaction off against the paper statement. Just thought the reconciling function would be appropriate, as it works a dream for my current accounts, making my life so much easier…

Thanks

Muffin

8

I’m going to invite @lubos to have a look at this problem. It just doesn’t seem right.

9

If the BR works for your Current Accounts then it should equally work for your Credit Card. If it doesn’t then there has to be a data problem.

You didn’t state, if at any point you had exactly matching balances - CC Statement v’s Manager CC.

Back in 2113, was this a brand new CC or and existing one. If an existing one did any outstanding balance get taken up with in the Starting Balances

What was your 2013 Start Date and what was the date of your first CC transaction.
If your Start Date was Jan 1, 2013 and the first transaction was Jan 8, 2013. then lets do a BR dated Jan 5, 2013 - Create new report - Select CC - Enter date as Jan 5, 2013,

If a brand new CC - under View enter zero “0” balance - the Reconciliation Report should produce
If an existing CC - under View enter the Starting Balance entered - the reconciliation Report should produce

The point being made is, that if you enter into the BR a date/balance combination that exactly matches a date/balance entry in the Manager CC account - then the Manager BR has no reason to fail because all data is in direct alignment - regardless of any CC Statement balance

10

Hi there Brucanna
Thanks for the further suggestions. Still got problems!

  1. My MM start date is 1/1/2013
  2. Starting balance for CC at 1/1/2013 = 0
  3. First transaction on 14/3/2013 is a transfer from my current account of 1,989.86 giving a balance of 1,989.86. So far so good.
  4. If I then do a reconciliation report for a couple of days later, entering the balance on that date, obtained from the CC account on MM there should be complete reconciliation as per your post.
  5. However, this doesn’t happen. MM shows the balance from the last reconciliation date, with a next day balance of zero even though all the transactions for that day are listed below.

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I’ve uploaded some screen shots to demonstrate the problem.

Hope this clarifies things.

Kind regards

Muffin

11

OK, your first screenshot of the Bank Reconciliation Statement is good news, your CC account has been reconciled to Jun 8, 2013. Now we can start from there. In your third screen shot it appears that you are only doing a reconciliation for one day - from the 8th to the 9th. We know the balance for the 8th is correct, but is the Manager CC account balance for the 9th actually zero - it appears that the balance should be -1320.46 (1312.36 + 8.10), is this correct, if yes then click the View button next to the CC report and then click the edit next to the 9th and change the figure to -1320.46 and the report should work - fingers crossed

1 Like
12

Manager shows what it knows. In this case, you must have entered before that closing balance on 09/06/2013 was 0.00 which Manager says it can’t be, that’s why it’s asking you again to check those closing balances to make sure they are entered correctly.

If they are entered correctly, then transactions entered in Manager don’t explain the movement between closing balances. Maybe some transactions are missing or amounts are entered incorrectly.

Just read the bold text and follow the instructions. It’s impossible to get stuck there.

13

Sure didn’t, Lubos. I’m well aware of how to use the reconciliation part of MM. I feel that the database for that account is at fault. I created a new account, imported what downloads I could ( about 12mths) and started from scratch. MM performed faultlessly. I’ll archive/hide the old account and use the new for more recent statements.

14

It doesn’t really matter. It takes one click on Edit button to tell Manager what is real closing balance as per bank statement. 0.00 can be easily corrected.

15

Yep, but, in this corrupted account, MM asks for a closing balance for every single day up to the stated reconciliation date set in the report creation, even though every balance next to each and every transaction is correct; there is no conflict, as any balance I enter is from the MM account (not a paper sheet from my bank). MM sure knows what is there; all MM has to do is confirm all its original data. On these hundreds of occasions it doesn’t.

16

The only explanation is that someone was desperately trying to get through reconciliation process by constantly clicking Update when Manager was asking for closing balances for various days. By default 0.00 will be set in the field.

Anyway, newer versions prevent this scenario as it has been common issue among many users.

17

Good to hear.

Whilst I may have done the ‘Zero Mania’ in a different state of
unconsciousness, it must have been too distant in the past for me to
recall, or confess to!! What may have happened is when I got several zero
balances ( there is no ‘update’ or ‘cancel’ at this point on the screen) I
abandoned by either ‘Back’ or selecting another menu item to come out. May
be these actions are the update you describe, in which case I can see why
the reconciliation process id sabotaged.
Thanks

Muffin