Dealing with the arcane UK clearing system

[Edward Grace]

Dear All,

This must be such a common problem that I imagine there's a simple  
"best practice" for dealing with it - but I'm unsure what to do.

In the UK it can take a considerable amount of time for transfers  
between banks to clear.  The result is that I can have money debited  
from account A, and three days later be credited to account B.

When I import my statements for accounts A and B, how do I neatly  
match the debits and credits?  Currently I have set up a dummy  
"Clearing" account.  So payments get debited from A and credited to  
"Clearing" - then a few days later get debited from "Clearing" and  
credited to B.

This has the down side that looking at account "A" or "B" money only  
ever goes from and to "Clearing" - clearly undesirable.

What's the best way to deal with this?

Regards,

-ed