9 Common Bank Reconciliation Problems & How to Fix Them

Knowing your numbers– it's rule number one to running a successful business. As your company grows and transaction volume increases, bank reconciliation problems often rear their ugly head. This critical financial process—comparing your internal financial records with bank statements to ensure they match—becomes increasingly complex with business growth. Without proper reconciliation, businesses risk making decisions based on inaccurate financial data, potentially missing fraud, and creating tax compliance issues.

Manual reconciliation processes not only consume valuable time but also introduce a higher risk of human error. According to recent studies, approximately 30% of companies have errors in their financial records due to lack of proper bank reconciliation processes, and organizations lose an estimated 5% of their annual revenues to fraud each year, which regular bank reconciliations help detect and prevent.

Let's take a look at the most common bank reconciliation problems, how finance automation solutions can serve as a savior, and ways to ensure that your bank reconciliation statement is in working order at all times.

Coming Up

What are the Steps in Bank Reconciliation?

Most Common Bank Reconciliation Problems

How Automation Reduces Bank Reconciliation Problems

How to Fix Bank Reconciliation Problems?

Bank Reconciliation Made Simple

What are the Steps in Bank Reconciliation?

To complete bank reconciliation successfully, follow these steps:

Pre-step: Verify Opening Balances

Before beginning the actual reconciliation, confirm that your opening balance matches the ending balance from your previous reconciliation. This ensures you're starting from an accurate position.

1. Access Bank Records

Firstly, you'll need your list of transactions from your bank statement or online banking account. This includes business credit card statements, too. Collect all relevant statements for the period you're reconciling, including any supplementary accounts.

2. Access Business Records

Secondly, and for comparison sake, you'll need your ledger of incoming and outgoing transactions. If this is stored in spreadsheets across desktops, the process of collection can take some time. Alternatively, if you use software and a finance automation solution, you can connect your systems and access this data easily.

3. Perform Transaction Matching

Check each transaction line-by-line to ensure internal and external documents match. As you can imagine, the heftier your transaction list (and use of payment processors is), the more time this will take to do manually. Look for discrepancies in amounts, dates, or missing transactions in either record.

4. Record Withdrawals and Adjustments

Be sure to record all withdrawals on your books, including accounting for bank fees and items that aren't as obvious. Make necessary adjustments for:

• Bank service charges
• Interest earned
• NSF (non-sufficient funds) checks
• Electronic transfers
• Automatic payments

5. Confirm Matching Balances

Once you've cleared and confirmed all transactions match, the business bank balance and your business account balances should match. This matching starting point will lead off your next period's bank reconciliation process. Document any reconciling items for future reference.

Most Common Bank Reconciliation Problems

Although the process of performing bank reconciliations is a straightforward step-by-step ordeal, it tends to not always go exactly as planned. This is because there are discrepancies and common investigative work needed to understand why these discrepancies exist (because sometimes, they are justifiable).

Here's a look at common bank reconciliation problems (or we should say, hurdles that can be overcome):

1. Cash in Transit Delays

Moving cash isn't always immediate. As such, when deposits have been made, whether it be via electronic payment, check, wire transfer, cash, etc, the bank may not have processed it at the time you're performing your reconciliation. This could show a gap in your funds as the bank has to clear the record of the cash in transit.

Example: Your retail store deposited $3,200 in cash and checks on Friday afternoon, but since banks don't process weekend transactions, it won't appear in your bank records until Monday. If you reconcile accounts over the weekend, this creates a temporary $3,200 discrepancy.

2. Outstanding Checks

The same delays can occur with checks. If a check is issued, but has yet to be deposited, it'll show in your outgoing funds in your internal records, but not taken from your bank account just yet.

This may necessitate carrying the check balance to the following month to balance accounts. If you're going to have to do this, then you need to be sure you keep track of the record that needs to move across periods.

Example: Your manufacturing company issued a $4,750 check to a raw materials supplier on the 29th of June, but it won't be processed until July 3rd. This means your June reconciliation will show this amount as a discrepancy that needs to be properly documented and carried forward.

Manually doing so can lead to mistakes and forgetfulness, whereas a software solution can automatically carry transactions for you.

3. Data Entry Errors

While it's less than optimal, it's definitely probable that recording errors may have occurred which can throw off your balances.

For example, if someone improperly records a deposit value, then your reconciliation will need extra work to find and fix the mistake. These can happen on the business or bank side (although banks rarely do make these types of mistakes).

Example: Your accounting clerk transposes digits when entering a customer payment, recording $2,590 instead of $2,950. This $360 difference will cause reconciliation issues until the error is identified and corrected.

4. Bank Fees and Charges

It's easy to overlook bank fees, such as withdrawal fees or overdraft fees. Naturally, these must be accounted for because they contribute to the ending balance.

Example: Your tech startup's bank statement includes a $45 wire transfer fee and a $25 monthly account maintenance charge that weren't entered in your accounting system. These unrecorded fees of $70 will create a discrepancy during reconciliation.

If you are able to perform bank reconciliation consistently, it's easier to include these fees in a timely manner. With bank reconciliation software, it's simple to perform reconciliation as often as daily without any extra effort required.

5. Unauthorized Withdrawals

It's an unfortunate, but sad reality that unauthorized withdrawals can occur. Fraud can wreak havoc on a business, so it's of utmost importance to catch it before it gets out of control.

Example: While reconciling accounts, your accounting team notices three unusual ATM withdrawals of $300 each that weren't authorized by management. This prompt discovery through regular reconciliation allows you to report potential fraud to your bank immediately, limiting further damage.

By performing bank reconciliations consistently, it's easier to spot when transactions take place that shouldn't have. Banks offer protection to freeze accounts in such cases; it's the business' responsibility to take action and make that call.

6. Voided Checks

It could also be the case that you've sent a check to a recipient that was then voided and reissued. In some instances, the payee could still cash the original check, and if the bank clears it, then you'll have a double entry where there should only have been one. To inhibit this from taking place, it's best practice to void the check through the bank and inform them about it.

Example: Your consulting firm voided check #5678 for $1,850 after a vendor reported it was lost, and you issued a replacement. Later, during reconciliation, you discover that both the original and replacement checks were processed, creating an unexpected $1,850 duplicate payment.

7. Currency Conversion Mismatches

If your business has an account in your country's currency, but receives payments from other currencies, there could be mismatches due to the different currency conversions across systems.

Example: Your e-commerce business receives a payment of £5,000 from a UK client. You record it as $6,350 based on that day's exchange rate, but by the time it settles in your account two days later, the pound has weakened, resulting in a deposit of $6,220, creating a $130 reconciliation discrepancy.

8. Bulk Transactions

The ultimate complexity can occur if your bank statement presents transactions as bulk items, rather than individual records. This makes it nearly impossible to go line-by-line manually to compare records. However, with an automation solution, you can compare more records in less time and make it easier to spot discrepancies, even with bulk translation values listed.

Example: Your restaurant uses a credit card processor that batches all daily transactions into a single deposit. Your bank statement shows one deposit of $8,745, but this represents 87 individual credit card transactions in your point-of-sale system that must be reconciled individually.

9. Complex Records

In the case of complicated internal processes and multiple data sources, it can become difficult to keep track of each record and where it is noted. There are different transaction relations, such as one-to-one or many-to-many.

Example: Your distribution company receives a single payment of $12,400 from a retailer that covers five different invoices of varying amounts. In your accounting system, these appear as five separate receivables, but the bank shows just one deposit, creating a reconciliation challenge that requires additional documentation.

Logic is needed to figure out how to match such transactions, as well as having connected data systems. Automation solutions provide for reliability and accuracy that humans may struggle with given the various exception items and data sources.

How Automation Reduces Bank Reconciliation Problems

Even when you have total control of your bank reconciliation formula and process, challenges arise, as mentioned above. It’s often inevitable, so having automation software in place to help reconcile can completely transform your workplace for the better.

Here’s what automation can do to reduce your common bank reconciliation problems:

1. Connected Data

As a starting point, you can easily collect and combine your financial data from multiple systems and sources using an automation software solution. With the use of APIs, automation software can even connect to legacy systems, so none of your necessary data gets lost in the shuffle. 

2. Carrying Records

For transactions that need to be carried or exempt from one financial accounting period to another, manual bank reconciliation will naturally become messy in such cases. With an automation solution, the system will track these exceptions and carry data 

3. Transaction Matching

With automation software, transaction matching is made easy. The software is designed to handle even the most complex transactions, along with a high volume of transactions. This is especially useful for multiple payment providers such as Amazon, eBay, Stripe, Worldpay and Paypal. 

The system will connect data, transform it into the required formats, and perform the process of reconciliation. Should you need to be notified of an exception or anomaly, you’ll be made aware. Otherwise, you’ll be able to review, sign-off, and continue closing your books as usual. 

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Comparison: Manual vs. Automated Reconciliation

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How to Fix Bank Reconciliation Problems?

With this knowledge of automation software, you can understand how the most straightforward and surefire fix to bank reconciliation problems is to use the technology!

Before we dive a little deeper into the value of automation software, consider the following best practices, too:

Reconciliation Best Practices Checklist:

✓ Verify opening balances - Ensure that your opening balance matches your bank statement so you start reconciling for the right amount

✓ Review previous reconciliations - Be sure to check the prior period's reconciliation records to see that there aren't any extra transactions pending that need to be moved into this period

✓ Increase reconciliation frequency - Run the bank reconciliation process more often (daily or weekly instead of monthly) to avoid mistakes, catch fraud in its tracks, and keep your records in clean order

✓ Implement consistent procedures - Establish standardized reconciliation processes that all team members follow

✓ Cross-check all transactions - Verify each transaction against its supporting documentation before accepting it as reconciled

✓ Investigate discrepancies immediately - Don't let unexplained differences accumulate; resolve them as they appear

✓ Document all reconciling items - Keep clear records of any adjustments made during reconciliation

✓ Segregate financial duties - Ensure the person reconciling accounts isn't the same person processing transactions

You guessed it again– the implementation of a finance automation solution that automates your bank reconciliation process will correct all of the above issues and make constant reconciliation possible. With a solution, you can streamline and standardize any type of reconciliation.

Your business increases its visibility and internal control, reduces compliance risk, and controls having any key person dependencies. With drag-and-drop functionality and customizable workflows, you can initiate any finance process to be run without hassle and without mistakes.

That way, your team can maximize their productivity levels and focus on high-level tasks, instead of being stuck on data entry and manual transaction matching activities.

Bank Reconciliation Made Simple

Bank reconciliations are vital for proper business functioning and to make informed decisions. When dealing with bank reconciliation problems, your business will find itself wasting time and potentially losing money (in ways that are otherwise preventable).

Manual errors are humanly impossible to prevent entirely, so it makes the most sense to make use of a finance automation solution as your problem-solver!

This way, you can automate, standardise, and execute bank reconciliation (along with additional solutions) in minutes instead of days and free your time for providing more value ad insights to the business.