Dealing with the arcane UK clearing system

Edward Grace ej.grace at imperial.ac.uk
Tue Oct 30 14:09:26 EDT 2007


I agree with other people that this "shouldn't be necessary", however  
when importing OFX (or quicken) statements from my various accounts I  
want to be able to sensibly reconcile them with one another - without  
duplication.

If I don't use the "funds in transit" approach then it's a pain.  
Money appears twice in the same account some times.  Imagine the  
following:

1) Download my current account .OFX (checking account in the US) -  
let's say I've moved 1000.00 to my savings account.  When working  
through the list of transactions I select the  destination to credit  
as my savings account.

2) Download my savings account .OFX - when working through these  
transactions I select the incoming 1000.00 (which has a different  
date to the previous outgoing one) as coming from my current account.

I now end up with two transactions depositing 1000.00 in my savings  
account - all rather confusing.

I've settled on the following:

1) A placeholder "Asset" account called "Clearing", under which I  
have names corresponding to the same accounts as in the Assets, e.g.

Assets
+- Current Account
+- Savings Account
+-Clearing
   +- Current Account
   +- Savings Account

This way when I import the Current account OFX transfers to my  
savings account are not made to Assets:Savings account but to  
Assets:Clearing:Savings account.

When I import the Savings account OFX transfers incoming cash does  
not come from Assets:Current Account but from Assets:Clearing:Current  
Account.

This now makes sense to me.  Does it sound like the "right thing to do"?

By parking the money in 'Clearing:<blah>' I'm also curious to see how  
much "The Man" makes from me in limbo interest...  ;-)

Thanks all,

-ed

On 30 Oct 2007, at 17:08, Keith A. Milner wrote:

> On Tuesday 30 October 2007 16:46:41 Alexander Titov wrote:
>> gnu cash is intended to record your company's operations rather then
>> your bank's operations. So record the transfer transaction with  
>> the date
>> your company decided to do it. You can ask your bank for moving  
>> money a
>> few days later. When the money is transferred by bank and you see  
>> them
>> at statement - check the cleared flag on the transaction.
>>
>
> I agree.
>
> This sort of excruciating transactional detail isn't normally  
> required. Even
> large organisations don't normally record it unless banking or  
> other related
> transactions are part of their core business.
>
> By the way, I don't believe this is due to the UK being more arcane  
> than any
> other banking system. From my experience, European banking seems to  
> be more
> modern than some other Western banking systems I have experienced.  
> Clearing
> delays happen in many banking systems and, these days, I suspect  
> they are
> partly an artificial way of making more money from you.
>
> Cheers,
>
> -- 
> Keith Milner
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