Catching up a new client’s bank statements without missing a transaction

A new client hands you a folder of PDF bank statements and a year of books that were never kept. The bank feed only reaches back so far, so the history has to come from the statements. The slow part is getting every transaction off the page. The risky part is not noticing when one didn't make it.

This is the routine that keeps a catch-up quick and gives you something to point to when the client asks whether the numbers are right.

1. Collect the right files

Ask for statements downloaded from online banking, not scans or phone photos. A downloaded PDF has real text in it, so a converter can read it exactly. A scan is a picture of text and has to be guessed at. If the client can only send scans, ask whether they can log in and download the same months instead. It saves you hours.

Get every month for every account, including savings and credit cards. Gaps are much easier to spot now than after you've started categorising.

2. Check the statements join up before converting anything

Each statement's opening balance should equal the previous month's closing balance. Line the statements up by date and check that before you convert a single page. A month that doesn't join up means a statement is missing, or one covers a different account. It's the cheapest mistake to catch, and it takes two minutes.

3. Convert, then reconcile every month

Whatever you use to get the transactions out, check each month against its own statement before it goes anywhere near the books:

opening balance + money in − money out = closing balance

If it matches to the cent, nothing was dropped, doubled or put on the wrong side. If it doesn't, the size of the gap usually tells you why: one transaction's amount means a missing row, twice an amount means it's on the wrong side, and the statement's opening balance means a "balance brought forward" line got counted as a transaction. There's more on reading the gap in why a statement spreadsheet doesn't balance.

Keep the result. A month-by-month list of "reconciled to the statement" is a useful thing to hand the client, and to have on file if a figure is questioned later.

4. Watch the overlap with the bank feed

Once the client's bank is connected in QuickBooks or Xero, the feed brings in recent transactions on its own. Find the first date the feed covers and only import statement transactions from before it. Importing both for the same weeks is the most common way catch-up work ends up with duplicates.

5. Import in the format the software wants

QuickBooks Online's Upload from file takes a CSV with three columns (Date, Description, Amount) or four (Date, Description, Credit, Debit), up to 1,000 lines and 350 KB per upload, so a busy account may need several files. Xero recommends OFX for manual imports. Both now offer to read PDF statements directly as well (Xero only in the US and Canada), which can work for a few months, but you lose the chance to check each month before it lands in the books.

For the details, see importing a bank CSV into QuickBooks Online, or the free bank CSV converter if the client did send CSV exports.

6. Think about where client statements go

A year of a client's statements shows their income, their spending and their account numbers. Before uploading them to an online converter, check where they're processed, how long they're kept and whether they're passed on to anyone else. Your own obligations, such as the FTC Safeguards Rule for US tax preparers or GDPR in the UK and EU, apply to the tools you choose. There's a short checklist in is it safe to upload bank statements online?.

How statement2sheets fits in

statement2sheets was built for this job. You can drop in up to 20 statements at once, and each one is checked against its own opening and closing balances, so step 3 happens as it converts. You download the batch as one file, with Source and Account columns so every row traces back to its statement, or as separate files, in CSV, Excel or OFX. It runs in your browser, so client statements are never uploaded. There's more on the page for bookkeepers, or try it on a statement.