Reconciling Bank Accounts for Your Business
The process of reconciling the bank accounts for your business refers to proving out cash — verifying that what you have in your business’s bank accounts actually matches what the bank thinks you have in those accounts.
Before you reconcile your accounts, it’s important to be sure that you’ve made all necessary adjustments to your books. When you make adjustments to your cash accounts, you identify and correct any cash transactions that may not have been properly entered into the books. You also make adjustments to reflect interest income or payments, bank fees, and credit-card chargebacks.
If you’ve done everything right, your accounting records should match the bank’s records when it comes to how much cash you have in your accounts. The day you close your books probably isn’t the same date as the bank sends its statements, so do your best at balancing the books internally without actually reconciling your checking account.
Correcting any problems during the process of proving out will minimize problems you may face reconciling the cash accounts when that bank statement actually does arrive.
You’ve probably reconciled your personal checking account at least a few times over the years, and you’ll be happy to hear that reconciling business accounts is a similar process. The following table shows one common format for reconciling your bank account:
Bank Reconciliation
| Transactions |
Beginning Balance |
Deposits |
Disburse-ments |
Ending Balance |
| Balance per bank statement |
$ |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Deposits in transit (those not shown on statement) |
|
$ |
|
$ |
| Outstanding checks (checks that haven’t shown up
yet) |
|
|
($) |
($) |
| Total |
$ |
$ |
$ |
$ |
| Balance per checkbook or Cash in Checking (which should be the
same) |
|
|
|
$ |
Accounting Glossary
accounting equation
The equation Assets = Liabilities + Equity, which demonstrates the two-sided nature of accounting and is useful for explaining the concept of double-entry accounting (or double-entry bookkeeping).
Accounting Glossary
accounting period
The time period for which financial information is being tracked in a business, such as monthly, quarterly, or annually.
Accounting Glossary
accounts receivable
An account that records the amounts that customers owe to a business.
Accounting Glossary
adjusting entry
A correction made to a bookkeeping account that adjusts for accounting errors or other necessary changes at the end of the accounting period.
Accounting Glossary
cash flows
Used to describe the source or sources of cash or how cash is used.
Accounting Glossary
Chart of Accounts
A list of all the accounts used by a business, including what types of transactions go into each account.
Accounting Glossary
debit
An accounting entry that increases an asset or expense account, and decreases a liability or income account.
Accounting Glossary
dividends
A portion of a company’s profits paid by share of common stock on a quarterly or annual basis.
Accounting Glossary
FASB
Financial Accounting Standards Board. FASB is the highest-ranking authority in the private (non-government) sector of the U.S. for making pronouncements on GAAP and for keeping accounting standards up-to-date.
Accounting Glossary
Federal Unemployment Tax
In the U.S., the fund that used to be known simply as Unemployment. Employers contribute to the fund, and states also collect taxes to fill their unemployment fund reserves. (The acronym FUTA means Federal Unemployment Tax Act.)
Accounting Glossary
fidelity bonds
A type of insurance — typically carried by employers for their employees — that helps guard against theft and reduce the risk of loss.
Accounting Glossary
FIFO
First-in, first-out. A method for costs of goods sold in which a business charges out product costs to cost of goods sold expense in the chronological order in which the goods were acquired.
Accounting Glossary
fungible
Describes a product that is interchangeable and virtually indistinguishable from another product.
Accounting Glossary
General Ledger
A summary of all of a business’s accounts and transactions.
Accounting Glossary
IASB
International Accounting Standards Board. The IASB (based in London) is the main authoritative accounting standards setter outside the U.S.
Accounting Glossary
Journals
The location in which bookkeepers keep records (in chronological order) of daily company transactions.
Accounting Glossary
LIFO
Last-in, first-out. A method for costs of goods sold that selects the last item you purchased first, and then works backward until you have the total cost for the total number of units sold during the period.
Accounting Glossary
LLP
Limited liability partnership. A legal structure that state laws offer to qualified professionals in which all the partners have limited liability.
Accounting Glossary
PC
Professional corporation. A legal structure that state laws offer to qualified professionals who otherwise would have to operate as an unlimited partnership liability.
Accounting Glossary
petty cash
A cash account that businesses keep on hand for unexpected expenses.
Accounting Glossary
revenue
Monies that are collected in the process of selling a company’s goods and services.
Accounting Glossary
salvage value
The amount that an asset is worth after it has been fully depreciated.
Accounting Glossary
statement of cash flows
A financial statement that summarizes a business’s cash inflows and outflows during an accounting period.
Accounting Glossary
transactions
Economic exchanges between a business or other entity and the parties with which the entity interacts and makes deals.
Accounting Glossary
worker’s compensation insurance
A type of insurance carried by employers that covers its employees in case they are injured on the job.
