Flare streamlines the bank reconciliation process, automating some reconciliation tasks to save you time and increase efficiency.

• Record transactions in Flare before performing bank reconciliation.
• Bank reconciliation overview and terminology.
• When to reconcile bank transactions.

Record transactions in Flare before
performing bank reconciliation

It's a good idea to consistently perform the following tasks in Flare. Doing so will make your bank reconciliation workflow much easier.

We recommend that you:

• Always create invoices in Flare (even if they are not sent to your customers).
  
  
• Always record bills in Flare soon after they are received.
  
  
• Always record Bank transfers in book accounts soon after the bank transfer is made. For example, when you transfer money from your bank Savings account to your bank Checking account, record the transfer in Flare book accounts.
  
  
• Record payments made by customers via Sales > Payments soon after you receive payment.
  
  
• Record payments you’ve made to vendors via Purchases > Payments soon after you’ve made the payment.

Though some of these tasks can be performed when a bank transactions file is imported, the reconciliation process is made easier by adhering to the steps above instead of waiting until checks clear your bank and the statement is auto-downloaded or imported.

Bank reconciliation overview & terminology

Bank reconciliation is the process of matching your bank statement transactions with transactions in financial accounts you've created in Flare.

• Bank: your bank account transactions as they appear on bank statements that are auto-downloaded or that you import.
  
  
• Book: bank/financial accounts that you've created in Flare.
  
  
• Auto-download: a bank account transaction file that Flare downloads automatically after you've set up a bank feed.
  
  
• Import: an alternative to auto-download – you may manually import a bank account's transaction file into Flare.
  
  
• Bank transactions file: your bank statement file. The bank transactions file may be auto-downloaded by setting up a bank feed, downloaded manually from your bank and imported into Flare, or created by you as a CSV file that you import into Flare.
  
  
• Bank Reconciliation "Actions": when reconciling a bank account with a book account, you may "Match", "Find Match", "Add" or "Ignore" the transactions. View detailed bank reconciliation steps.

When to reconcile bank transactions

When you choose to reconcile bank transactions is up to you, although to ensure your Flare book accounts (bank accounts you've created in Flare) more accurately reflect transactions in your real-world bank accounts, we recommend that you reconcile bank transactions each time a bank feed is downloaded, or, each time you import a bank transactions file that you've downloaded from online banking.

Start by looking for the "unreconciled" status in the top ribbon of a bank account's screen.

Do the following:

1. Click "Bank" in Flare's main menu (1 below).
   
   
   
   
2. Click open the bank accounts dropdown menu (2 below) and click "book balance" beneath the account you want to view (3 below).
   
   
   
   
3. In the top ribbon (below) Flare displays the number of unreconciled bank transactions (A below) and the number of unreconciled book transactions (B below).
   
   
   
   
   
   
4. To begin reconciling bank transactions with the book account, click the "Reconcile" button (4 above). Flare will take you to the reconciliation screen which will show bank transactions on the left and book transactions on the right (see below).
   
   
   
   
   Flare will display possible matches that exist in your book account (outlined below). Using the "Actions" dropdown, you can choose to match a transaction, find a match, add the transaction (if it doesn't exist in your book account), or ignore it if isn't a relevant business transaction.
   
   
   
   
     Transactions can be reconciled one at a time or in batches. See "Batch reconciliation" for more information.
   
   

   For a detailed walk-through of bank reconciliation, see "Bank reconciliation steps".

Learn more

• Bank reconciliation steps.
• Batch bank reconciliation.