Excel Wizards?

[smilingcat]

look at the difference between your spread sheet, your checkbook and bank statement.

• if the difference is twice one of the entries, then you've added instead of subtracting a check you wrote.
• if the difference is one of the entries then, the banks have not recorded the transaction
• if it is some odd number then, did you leave out one of the numbers?
  entered $9.45 instead $99.45 easy to do and hard to catch.

If you still have a problem, narrow down the mistake by checking at the middle of the week instead of at the end of the week. If your halfway point is okay then the mistake is in the later half of the week, if the mistake shows up halfway through, then the mistake is in the first half of the week.

I use the sum function "=sum($b$2: $b$25)" kind of thing. use positive number for deposits and minus sign when I withdraw. This way, I'm not dependent on writing out some big equations.

[Melalvai]

The most common mistake I make is adding or subtracting something twice.

It can happen that the bank makes a mistake. We switched banks recently because the old bank's online banking system had some sort of glitch where every now and then it would decide that our starting balance when we opened the account was something other than what it was. We literally had to go ALL the way back through our transaction history to figure that out. I got to the very first transaction ever, and wait a minute, it was the $100 deposit to open the account and the online banking statement said our balance was $39 at that point! Since when was 0 + 100 = 39??

Another thing that can help is go do something else, take a walk or go for a ride, and come back to it in a bit. How many times have I torn out my hair trying to find the mistake, I finally have to go fix supper or something, and when I get back to it the mistake just jumps out at me. Where the heck was it hiding the whole time I was searching for it?

Good luck, hope you get it figured out.

[Catrin]

After three days of crossing my eyes to try and find this, I succeeded! I had accidentally recorded a payment in my checkbook (from the spreadsheet) that doesn't happen until 2/3 - that will do it! Things now balance properly, and thank you again for your tips! Not all of my payments have hit my account as of yet so I didn't catch on that one of the recorded payments in my register is for later...