Best practice for uncashed cheques?

[John Ralls]

On Oct 27, 2012, at 8:41 AM, Marc Sherman <msherman at projectile.ca> wrote:

> How do folks handle cheques they wrote a while ago but which remain uncashed for a while?
> 
> Up until now I've been leaving them in the register with the original date written on the cheque, but I'm having increasing trouble figuring out where the missing money is when I go to reconcile with downloaded transactions from the bank and my current balance doesn't match my cleared balance.
> 
> I've been toying with the idea of moving the dates forward for these cheques to the next business day after I import/reconcile. That better reflects the current reality -- those cheques could be cashed any time in the future, so my current balance is correct and my future balance best predicts the worst case scenario. Also, the act of finding and advancing the cheques gives me a chance to chase down the person I wrote them to and, if needed, gently remind them to cash my cheque.
> 
> But it's a pain to do this -- is there any way to automate it?

Not without writing a little program to do so. You could use guile, python, or C.

But I don't see the problem, particularly if you d/l transactions from the bank to mark them as cleared: When you open the reconcile window, those old checks will be at the top, and they won't be marked, so they should stand out as clearly (or even more so) than if you changed the dates. As long as you enter the balance from your statement and not the register into the "reconcile information" dialog box, reconciling should be almost automatic. What part of that isn't working for you?

Regards,
John Ralls