Been entering transactions manually and just linked up my bank account. However, in doing so, a whole new GL was created with my current balance, doubling cash. Help?

When you connect your bank to QuickBooks, all your current and past transactions going back as far as 90 days or even up to 24 months are automatically downloaded, @clare-a-valley.  Let me explain this in more detail.

Before proceeding, did you create a separate bank account for your manually entered transactions? Once transactions are downloaded to QuickBooks, a new general ledger (GL) account will be created based on the bank associated with those transactions from the past. This is why you may be seeing duplicate entries for both manually entered and downloaded transactions.

If you had a separate bank account for for manually entered transactions, and the downloaded transactions from your bank include the same ones you already entered, you can exclude the duplicates transactions. This way, you’ll keep only the new transactions that haven’t already been added manually.

To ensure that the current transactions populate the existing GL account you created for the manually added transactions going forward, you can merge the new GL account with the existing account you used for manually added transactions. Ensure to exclude any duplicate transactions before merging.

Here’s how to do it:
 

1. Go to your Chart of Accounts.

2. Select the new GL account created in QuickBooks.

3. Click the Edit drop-down menu.

4. In the Account Name field, change the name of the new GL account to the existing GL account name.

5. A pop-up window will appear asking you to confirm the merge. Choose "Yes, merge accounts."

6. Once done, click Save.




Please let us know if you have additional questions or concerns.