Duplicate entries. Reconciliation.

[Doug Laidlaw]

Someone recently asked about files downloaded from his financial institution 
duplicating transactions already recorded, and how to prevent this.  Sorry, I 
deleted the message before decicing that I had something to say about it.

The problem is that downloaded files have cheque numbers and no payees.  In 
my case, in the QIF file, the cheque number appears in the Payee field, so it 
won't match with the Number field on the ledger.

I find these duplications invaluable for reconciliation purposes.  If I find 
such an entry, I mark the original entry as cleared, then delete the 
downloaded entry.  That way, I can keep my account balanced as I go along, 
and I don have to wait for a statement.

One feature I would like to see is the ability to preserve cleared entries if 
the reconciliation doesn't work, so I don't have to start from scratch next 
time.  I am a long time Quicken user, and Quicken has this.

Doug.