What reconciliation does
Reconciliation matches every line on your bank statement to a posting in your books. When it is complete, your bank account balance on the balance sheet equals the actual balance at the bank. This is the single most important monthly hygiene step in accounting — every other report depends on it.
The workbench layout
Open Accounting → Bank Reconciliation and pick an account. The page has two columns:
- Left: bank lines (from your bank feed or imported CSV/OFX) that have not been matched yet.
- Right: open invoices, recorded expenses, and bills that have not been matched to a bank line yet.
Each unmatched bank line shows a confidence-ranked list of suggested matches underneath it. Suggestions consider amount (exact match, ±2c rounding tolerance), date proximity, reference number, and historical pairing patterns.
Matching a receipt to an invoice
Click the suggested invoice. The line and the invoice both turn green and slide into the Matched today strip at the top. The invoice flips to Paid and the matching journal posts in the background:
- Dr Bank
- Cr Accounts Receivable
If no suggestion is right, click Find to search every open invoice across the tenant.
Creating an expense from a bank line
For a payment that does not match any existing record (a supplier you have not yet billed in, a card fee, a one-off purchase), click Create expense on the bank line. A side panel opens with the amount and date pre-filled. Pick the category, supplier and tax code, and save. The expense posts and the bank line is auto-matched in one step.
Bank rules
For recurring patterns — your software subscriptions, rent, the same petrol station — set up a rule once and the bank line is auto-categorised forever. From Accounting → Bank Rules:
- Match by contains text, exact text, amount equals, or amount range
- Apply category, supplier, tax code, and tracking category in one go
- Run Re-apply to backfill existing unmatched lines
Well-tuned rules typically auto-categorise 80%+ of bank traffic, leaving only the exceptions for human review.
When the balance does not reconcile
The footer of the workbench shows: bank balance (per the feed) vs book balance (per your GL). If they diverge, the difference is either an unmatched bank line, an unrecorded payment, or a duplicate. The workbench filters down by date range to help you triangulate. Once both balances tie, click Mark period reconciled to lock it.