Recocile checking account with OFX file

[Michael Hendry]

> On 17 Mar 2015, at 13:36, dave boland <dboland9 at fastmail.fm> wrote:
> 
> Michael,
>  
> You understanding is correct, but let me run through my process.
>  
> About once a month (except the last 4 - shame on me!!!), I go through the paper receipts - mostly cash purchases from the Wallet account, but some are on the debit or credit card accounts.
>  
> Next I download the csv version of my accounts (checking/debit card accounts, credit card account), and manually add the missing income/expenses.  The reason I do this manually is that normally there are very few updates to gnuCash accounts, so it works well for me.
>  
> Because I was so far behind, and there were a lot more credit card purchases than normal (Christmas season), I wanted an automated way to do this. 
>  
> My expectations were that I would download the OFX files (3 total), and then have gnuCash read them, match the transactions in the OFX files to ones existing in gnuCash (more on that in a moment), and display a list of transactions not matching anything in gnuCash.  I would accept the exact matches and they would automatically be reconciled.   The near-matches (date wrong - usually a day or two later than the transaction in gnuCash because they were either debit or credit card purchases), would need to be connected to the existing gnuCash transactions.  The new ones (automatic withdrawals, transactions I forgot to enter, etc.) need to be added and a description added for each.  Once done, the reconciliation would be done.  Repeat for the other two OFX files.
>  
> Matching transactions is hard. 

That’s the point I was trying to make. If it’s hard for you to do it by hand (that is, that the decisions are hard, not that the volume of work is high), then it’s going to be hard to specify a way in which the computer can make these decisions for you.

> At best, the date and amount in a file will match a transaction in gnuCash.  Sometimes only an amount will match.  So, gnuCash needs to display the matches in three groups - those that match by date and amount, those that match by amount, and those that have no matches at all.  That is the process that I use manually.

OK. I’ve never used OFX, so I can’t comment on how GnuCash handles this. I can see there can be problems in matching ATM withdrawals and other transactions which might occur several times a month for the same sum.

At this stage, do you use the GnuCash reconciliation procedure?

>  
> Hope this helps.  If not, then let me know if the mail group accepts image files

I’ve certainly seen screen-shots in some mailing list emails, but I tend to save screenshots on Dropbox and just include a link - as a courtesy to those who want to help other GnuCash users but don’t necessarily want their mailboxes filled with large image files!

> and I will attach graphics to illustrate what I mean (as time permits).  I plan on trying KMyMoney and jGnash (both double entry) to see if they suite my needs better.  If I find something that I like, I'll make a screen shot for you.

Thanks. GnuCash has done what I need for the last five years, so these products would have to be massively superior to get me to change…

Michael

>  
> Dave,
>  
> On Mon, Mar 16, 2015, at 11:07 AM, Michael Hendry wrote:
>>  
>>> On 16 Mar 2015, at 13:38, dave boland <dboland9 at fastmail.fm <mailto:dboland9 at fastmail.fm>> wrote:
>>>  
>>> All,
>>>  
>>> We seem to have gotten off my topic - how to import and reconcile bank transactions into gnuCash using an OFX file.  I backed up my gnuCash file, started the import process, and got the window listing the results (red, yellow, green).  I clicked on Help, but found it to be of little use.  I Googled gnuCash OFX import, but found very little and no official documentation.  A lot of the transactions the importer wanted to load were duplicates that varied by date only (date of actual transaction in gnuCash, date vendor got paid in the OFX file), and it was very confusing.  I decided to just download a CSV file, load it into LibreOffice Calc, and do every thing by hand.
>>>  
>>> Call me disappointed.  Hope that new releases of gnuCash improve the importer.
>>  
>> Sorry you’ve been disappointed, but perhaps you could explain clearly what you are looking for?
>>  
>> If I understand your original post correctly, you’ve been recording bank transactions, but you haven’t reconciled the accounts for a long time - you want the OFX import to bring in any transactions you’ve failed to record, correct any that you’ve misrecorded, and flag up any transactions that are in GnuCash but not in the bank’s version. While this is being done, the “Reconciled” flags will be set on the matching transactions, and at the end of it all the Balance in your bank statement will match the reconciled balance in GnuCash.
>>  
>> If this is what you want, I’m afraid you’re doomed to further disappointment - unless you can specify to the developers in great detail how this magic would be achieved.
>>  
>> Michael
>>  
>>> Dave,
>>> -- 
>>> dave boland
>>> dboland9 at fastmail.fm <mailto:dboland9 at fastmail.fm>
>>> -- 
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> 
> -- 
> dave boland
> dboland9 at fastmail.fm <mailto:dboland9 at fastmail.fm>
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