Reconciliations - cleared / reviewed transactions

jmatz

I think it would make a lot more sense to do reconciliations based on cleared or reviewed transactions, not the transaction amounts alone.

In other words, match the balances only for reviewed transactions. This forces us to check the transactions and make sure that sales taxes have been applied (most important), if applicable, as well as correct categorization, vendors, customers.

AlexL

Hey @jmatz . The system actually used to function this way but then we realized that this meant that you'd have transactions listed in your account that weren't actually on your statement as users would only verify the transactions that they needed. This way, your statement mirrors your account perfectly if fully reconciled and you don't have additional transactions that belong no where.

jmatz

Hey @AlexL. Sorry, I'm not sure I understand. Statement and Wave transactions should be mirrored in either case, but verifying would be simply like checking each transaction off individually to make sure they're correct. Alternatively, you wouldn't need to change the functionality; you could simply have a balance difference for cleared transactions. In this case, it would function the same and would just be a visual change. This may accommodate users who don't need to verify all transactions and also those that do. Or perhaps a setting to disable or enable. The way it's also possible to switch between accrual and cash basis accounting.

AlexL

@jmatz Got it. Thanks for further explaining that for me. What we previously did in an older platform was that when you checked off a transaction it would contribute to your running balance. With that being said, if you had checked off some but not all transactions and your balances still aligned, you could claim that your accounts were reconciled when really you had additional unverified transactions in the mix.

With this being said, we just unveiled the newest version of reconciliation and I don't think the team will be making any functionality changes anytime soon, but I'll definitely pass your feedback onto them so they have an idea of how this works for future iterations.

EricAtMeditateBetter

With respect to reconciliation: In Quicken (which I am looking to replace), I mark transactions that also appear in my budget spreadsheet. Then my spreadsheet tells me what my balance _should _be. I compare that to what the bank says, to find out if I have been recording things accurately. (Have found an amazing number of errors that way over the years, and have been able to successfully budget things during that time.)

But now Quicken wants to move me to annual payments to keep transaction downloads. That's milking it, in my book. And since I only use it for that purpose, I went looking for software I could purchase to do the same task. That's how I stumbled across Wave. (Since I am also starting a business, Wave's integrated business accounting will be worth paying for, at some point.)

So I created a Wave account, downloaded transactions, and started categorizing them. Marking a transaction as "reviewed" looks like the same thing as marking it "reconciled" in Quicken. But once I do that, I don't see any way to hide the items that have been reviewed. I'm guessing I need to delete them after the review is complete?

That's perfectly acceptable, but is there a way to select reviewed-transactions only, for a bulk delete. (I'm guessing there must be, and it's probably pretty simple!)