My past reconciliations must have gotten off with an update because my beginning balance is all messed up. Looks like my deposits aren't coming through...any ideas?

Hi Voyage,

Welcome to the Community. I am here to help you fix the beginning balance in QuickBooks Online.

The opening balance is the starting point for accounts in QuickBooks. If it is incorrect, it can affect all future reconciliations. Therefore, it is important to ensure that your opening balance is correct before checking your beginning balance.

Beginning balance issues may arise due to the following reasons:

• Someone entered an incorrect opening balance while creating the account in QuickBooks.
• Someone added transactions that occurred before the opening balance but didn't edit the original opening balance entry to reflect the change.
• Someone edited, deleted, moved, or unreconciled an already reconciled transaction. Doing so changes the ending balance of your last reconciliation, which impacts the beginning balance of the next one.
• Someone manually reconciled a transaction that didn't appear on the next reconciliation.

We have compiled some steps that you can follow to fix your beginning balance and get back on track with the reconciliation. Please refer to this link: Fix issues for accounts you've reconciled in the past in QuickBooks Online.

When you reconcile, you compare transactions in QuickBooks with the same ones on your bank statements. If QuickBooks doesn't match your bank statement at the end of a reconciliation, you can refer to this article: Fix issues at the end of a reconciliation in QuickBooks Online.

Feel free to post or interact about your QuickBooks concerns in this space. If you have any additional questions related to your reconciliation, let us know. We'll be here to lend a hand.

I had reconciled everything through last year February but when I jumped back in to reconcile the remaining months and get things ready for taxes here, the starting balance was way off (didn't match any starting balances for any statements from the past five + years) and it hadn't transferred any deposits over from my bank, just expenses. This also happened with our other business with whatever update Quickbooks did this year. Used to be able to change the starting balance as well but can't do that anymore either.

I understand it can be frustrating to find discrepancies in the starting balance while reconciling your account, Voyage. As such, I want to assist you in resolving this issue to ensure the accuracy of your financial records and a smooth reconciliation process.

To begin, may I ask what specific update in QuickBooks you are referring to? This information will help me provide you with the most accurate solution to fix the issue at hand.

In QuickBooks Online, the starting or opening balance is a crucial part of the reconciliation process, which has an impact on future reconciliations. If your balance amount doesn't match your bank statement, you can easily change it by going to the Chart of Accounts. However, please note that modifying it will affect your past reconciled transactions and the balance the next time you reconcile. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to change it:

1. Go to Transactions, then select Chart of Accounts.
2. Locate the bank account you've linked, then click View Register.
3. Select the Opening balance equity entry, then edit the amount in the Deposit column.
4. Once done, click Save.

Moreover, since you mentioned that your bank transactions only pulled up your expenses, you may need to manually import your missing bank transactions, particularly the deposits in the program. To do this, you'll need to download all your bank transactions in a CSV file from your bank's website, following the CSV formatting required by QuickBooks. After downloading, you can follow these steps to import them:

1. Go to Transactions, then select Bank Transactions.
2. Select the blue tile for the account you want to upload the transactions into.
3. Select the Link account dropdown, then select Upload from the file.
4. Choose Drag and Drop or select files, and select the file you downloaded from your bank, then, select Continue.
5. In the QuickBooks account dropdown, select the account you want to upload the transactions into, then select Continue.
6. Follow the onscreen steps to match the columns on the file with the correct fields in QuickBooks, then select Continue.
7. Select the transactions you like to import. Then select Continue.
8. Select Yes, then Done.

Once the import process is complete, you can match and categorize your downloaded transactions and continue reconciling your accounts.

Lastly, here's a reconciliation workflow that you may find helpful for future reference if you want to fix other issues within the process.

Also, QBO automatically creates a reconciliation report every time you finish reconciling.

I'm still around to help you if you need assistance regarding your starting balance. You can click the reply button below to enter your queries. 

Will the CSV File give me duplicate transactions if some of the transactions are already in the ledger? The expenses are there for the most part, just not the deposits and the reconciliation problem goes back further than I had last reconciled, years even.

Thanks for the prompt response, Voyage.

I understand your situation and know that reconciling your bank accounts is very important to all businesses. Let's go over fixing your transactions first before proceeding with the reconciliation process.

To start, please note that the syncing of bank or credit card transactions in QuickBooks Online (QBO) will depend on your financial institution. Thus, you'll have to reach out to your bank's support team to verify if there are ongoing issues on their end. You can also share your bank name so we can check for any related issues on our end.

Depending on your CSV file, you'll possibly import duplicate expense transactions if they're within that file, and you won't make edits to remove them. The good thing about QBO is that when you import bank transactions, you can select what to add in the For review tab during the process. See the screenshot below for your reference:

Moreover, please note that these transactions will only go to your account register if you categorize them from the For review tab. Thus, if some of your expenses are mistakenly imported, you can still exclude them so they will not appear in your bank register.

Nonetheless, ensure to compare the transactions to the ones showing on your bank statements when categorizing them. Then, proceed with your usual bank reconciliation.

It was my pleasure to see you here. Let me know if I have missed anything or if you have additional questions about importing your bank transactions into QBO. Have a good day ahead!

i have had the same problem in quickbooks desktop. 

I appreciate you posting here in the QuickBooks Community, @cmonroe1. Let me share more information about the beginning balance discrepancy.

When you Begin Reconciliation and select an account to reconcile, the Beginning Balance is zero or incorrect. It could be due to one of the following reasons:

• The account wasn't set up with a balance or with the right balance
• Previously cleared and reconciled transactions were voided, deleted, or modified
• You converted the file from another version of QuickBooks
• Possible data damage

In resolving the discrepancy, you may need to re-enter or edit the transactions. You can choose from the following options:

• Undo a previous reconciliation and redo it
• Ignore the discrepancy and let QuickBooks enter an offsetting adjustment

We can check the Audit Trail report to find out if there are transactions that were deleted or edited and pull up the Previous Reconciliation report to see all the details. To pull up the reports, please follow these steps:

1. Go to Reports, then Accountant & Taxes, and then Audit Trail.
2. Set the Account filter to the account reconcile.
3. Set the Account filter to the account you want to reconcile.
   1. Select Customize Report.
   2. Go to Filters, and then choose Account from the filters.
   3. Select the account in the Account dropdown.
4. Select Display. Set the Date filter with the From field blank and the To date set to the statement date and select OK.
5. Set the Entered/Modified filter with the From date set to the previous reconciliation creation date from the PDF, and the To field as today's date.

For more information about fixing the beginning balance, please check out this article: Fix beginning balance issues in QuickBooks Desktop.

Moreover, if you want to learn how to resolve common issues on previous reconciliation reports, you can refer to this article for more information. Resolve common issues on the Previous Reconciliation report.

If you still have concerns about reconciliation, you can always leave a reply on this thread. Have a great day.