Bank statement beginning balance does not equal previous month's ending balance.

LuckyLady2 · ‎January 17, 2022

I just acquired a new account who has been in business since 2014. Previous bookkeeper did not reconcile any bank statements for 2021. I am working on this now. My problem is that the Jan. 2021 beginning balance does not equal the checkbook register and all previous years have been reconciled. How do I correct this or find out what the problem is??

Pete_Mc · ‎January 17, 2022

That's a tough one to figure out. Some of the big "gotchas" are:

- Previously Reconciled transaction was deleted

- Previously Reconciled transaction was changed

- Big possibility that in Dec. 2021 they made an entry into Jan 2021 when they meant 2022

- And amount was modified

- Are you over or under? So are you looking for a Payment or Deposit?

You get the idea. Maybe start with sorting the Register by Amount and see if you can find a transaction for the same amount. Next, start a Reconciliation (doesn't matter the numbers are wrong) and just look to see if you find anything pending that's dated Jan 2021 or any other transaction out of wack. Also just look through Dec and Jan to see if you see anything out of wack.

Next, I'd take a chance that something changed in Dec. OR to confirm the Nov Reconciliation was correct, UnReconcile December and do it again. Hopefully the ending number in Nov will match the beginning number for Dec. If not, then you've got a bigger issue and the prior Bookkeeper may have just been checking things off vs. actually reconciling the accounts.

From there I'd check with the Accountant. They may be okay with just an entry to fix it (pending the amount). If not, it sounds like a fair amount of time will be involved to UnReconcile back to where you find there error and then move forward again.

Hope you'll find an obvious error.

View solution in original post

RCV · ‎January 17, 2022

I've got some steps we can perform to get your bank balance fixed, LuckyLady2.

The Beginning Balance is incorrect due to one of the following reasons:

No balance or an incorrect balance was entered when the account was set up.
Previously cleared and reconciled transactions were voided, deleted, or modified.
The file was converted from a different version of QuickBooks.
Possible data damage.

To find the transactions causing the discrepancy, we can run the Reconcile Discrepancy report. Here's how:

Go to the Reports menu.
Select Banking, then Reconciliation Discrepancy.
Choose the appropriate Account, then select OK. You now have a list of transactions that were changed since the last reconciliation. Use this report to identify the transaction/s causing the issue.
If you find a discrepancy, note the transaction date and the Entered/Last Modified, which will tell you when the change occurred.

To correct the discrepancy, you may need to re-enter or edit the transactions. We can also undo a previous reconciliation and redo it. Let me show you how:

Back up the QuickBooks company file.
In the Begin Reconciliation window, select Undo Last Reconciliation.
When prompted, tap Continue then OK.
Close and reopen the Begin Reconciliation window.

To provide you other troubleshooting solutions, you can check out this article: Fix beginning balance issues in QuickBooks Desktop.

Feel free to browse this link here if you need help with other tasks with bank feeds and reconciling accounts. It'll route you to our general payroll topics with articles.

Please know that I'm just a post away if you have any other questions about handling your accounts in QuickBooks. It'll always be my pleasure to help. Have a great day ahead.

Pete_Mc · ‎January 17, 2022

That's a tough one to figure out. Some of the big "gotchas" are:

- Previously Reconciled transaction was deleted

- Previously Reconciled transaction was changed

- Big possibility that in Dec. 2021 they made an entry into Jan 2021 when they meant 2022

- And amount was modified

- Are you over or under? So are you looking for a Payment or Deposit?

You get the idea. Maybe start with sorting the Register by Amount and see if you can find a transaction for the same amount. Next, start a Reconciliation (doesn't matter the numbers are wrong) and just look to see if you find anything pending that's dated Jan 2021 or any other transaction out of wack. Also just look through Dec and Jan to see if you see anything out of wack.

Next, I'd take a chance that something changed in Dec. OR to confirm the Nov Reconciliation was correct, UnReconcile December and do it again. Hopefully the ending number in Nov will match the beginning number for Dec. If not, then you've got a bigger issue and the prior Bookkeeper may have just been checking things off vs. actually reconciling the accounts.

From there I'd check with the Accountant. They may be okay with just an entry to fix it (pending the amount). If not, it sounds like a fair amount of time will be involved to UnReconcile back to where you find there error and then move forward again.

Hope you'll find an obvious error.

LuckyLady2 · ‎January 19, 2022

Check written in Jan was entered in Dec. and was showing as cleared. That was the difference.

Thx so much for your help!!

Pete_Mc · ‎January 19, 2022

Glad it worked out. Those kind of issues often are really obvious or they can be a royal pain to find.

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Bank statement beginning balance does not equal previous month's ending balance.