How to do a bank reconciliation

Doing a bank reconciliation in Swim is a process that is simplified significantly with adequate preparation and once you perform a reconciliation a few times, you will find that it is quick and painless. To do a bank reconciliation with Swim, you will need to have a few things organised before you attempt to reconcile your account. These are as follows:

• Ensure that your bank account has been setup properly in Swim, most notably with the correct Opening Balance as at the time that the account was recorded on the system.
• A record of your bank transactions so you can check them off with Swim as you go.
• An accurate closing balance so that you and the program both have something to work from. If you do not have a closing balance the process of reconciling becomes needless and a waste of time.

Once you have those things in order and you are properly prepared, you can start reconciling your account in Swim. To do this just follow the steps below:

1. Go to the Expenses Menu.
2. Click on View/Edit Accounts.
3. Find the bank account that you wish to reconcile in the list of accounts and click Reconcile to the right of its details.
4. You will then be presented with all of your transactions for that account, and you will be asked to enter a closing balance at the top left of this screen. You also have the option to add any notes about this reconciliation at the top right of the screen.
5. Once you enter your statement closing balance you then need to go through and match up each transaction in Swim with the ones recorded on your bank statement.
6. When you have found corresponding transactions that match, check the Cleared box next to the transaction and move on.
   Note: Just under where you entered your statement closing balance, you will notice that Out of Balance appears with a red cross to the right of it. When you have adequately cleared your transactions so that they match your statement closing balance, this cross will change to a green tick. This signifies that the account can be reconciled.
7. If you have any extra bank charges or interest to be added to this account, you can click on Bank Charges/Interest at the bottom of the screen and Swim will create a new invoice for you which will allow you to enter these details.
8. Once you have entered the details onto this invoice, click Go Back To: Reconcile at the bottom of the screen to be taken back to the reconciliation page for this bank account.
   Note: If there are any discrepancies with what appears on Swim and your account statement, you can log this by clicking on Log New Discrepancy at the bottom of the reconciliation screen.
9. Once you have logged your discrepancies and taken care of any other matters and the Out of Balance cross has changed to a tick, you will be able to reconcile the account by clicking on Reconcile Account at the bottom of the screen.
10. Click Ok to confirm, or Cancel to go back and make changes to the reconciliation.
11. You will then be taken to the BNK002:Bank Reconciliation Report which you will be able to preview and/or print. This report shows details of the reconciliation that you have just performed.