How Much Money Do You Really Have? **Stickily Me Please!**

[Songtan Sally]

I've seen this issue pop up a few times now and hopefully this will help! I will work on developing some illustrations to show the process but it's almost midnight here right now, so that's a job for tomorrow!

Every adult needs to know how to keep track of their finances. The following tutorial from eHow should make it simple enough!

How To Balance Your Checking Account

by eHow Personal Finance Editor

Introduction
Balanced checkbooks ensure that you possess the same amount of funds that the financial institution exhibits. Not very many people make it a habit to balance their checkbooks as they may not know how to balance a checkbook or they may feel they don’t have time for it. The truth is that balancing your check book only requires 10 to 30 minutes to complete if done on a monthly basis. It is easy and will clarify exactly how much funds are in your account. Read on to learn how to balance a checkbook.

Instructions
Difficulty: Easy
Things You'll Need

* Bank account statement(s)
* Pen
* Checkbook registry


Step One
Reconcile your checks. You want to make sure that the amounts you have written on your checks match what is on your bank statement. It is best if you have a copy of the checks that have been processed, canceled, or voided to verify the amounts. You need to place a check mark beside the checks on your checkbook register that are on your bank statement. If you notice there are some checks that have not been posted (debited from your bank account on the statement), don’t worry. This will be covered in later steps. Right now all you need to do is check off the checks that are listed on your bank statement.

Step Two
Reconcile your deposits. Now you need to mark off all of the deposits in your check register that match your bank statement.

Step Three
Reconcile your ATM withdrawals and debit card purchases.Once again, go through and check off all of your ATM withdrawals and debit card purchases that are listed on your bank statement. If you see any transactions on your bank statement that you didn’t record in your checkbook register, then copy the amounts from the bank statement to your checkbook register.

Step Four
Record interest earned and bank fees. This is one step that most people miss when its time to balance your checkbook. You will need to look at your bank statement and record any fees or interest amounts and record them in your bank register. This amount may not be much but it will affect your bottom line.

Step Five
List outstanding checks. Outstanding checks include checks that you have written that have not been posted to your account, ATM withdrawals and debit purchases. You can use the balancing form on the back of your statement or download one off the Internet. List all outstanding checks in the second column on your balancing form and total the column.

Step Six
List outstanding deposits. This step is similar to the previous step except you will list all outstanding deposits in the first column on your balancing form and total this column.

Step Seven
Calculate your balance. Take the ending balance located on your bank statement and place is on line one. On line two enter the total amount of outstanding deposits from the outstanding deposits column. On line three enter the total amount from the outstanding checks column. Now that is complete you are ready to calculate your balance. It is best to use a calculator for this step to ensure it is 100 percent accurate. The equation is ending balance plus outstanding deposits minus outstanding checks equals new balance. This total should match the ending balance in your checkbook register. If it doesn’t match you will need to re check the amounts entered to make sure they were entered correctly. One common mistake is when you enter $35 instead of $53. Now you know how to balance a checkbook on your own.

[Meghan]

This is GREAT! It took me a few years of scraping by before I learned how to take control of my (our) finances, and our lives are so much more stress free now.

Thanks , honey!

I'm gonna bump this and hope it gets stickied, maybe in the Finance section

[BubblesofBeer]

Oooo I think this is really good advice!!!

Nothing sucks more than over drafting and fees when it could of been avoided.

[Songtan Sally]

Trust me - I've been there and earned the badge! My ex-husband completely messed up our bank account. He'd enter checks written as deposits, forget to enter checks, and so on. When it finally caught up and a check actually bounced (which he blamed ME for!!), it took my neighbor and I four days with 10-key machines to go through the entire account from day one to fix it.

After that, he wasn't allowed to TOUCH the checkbook!

[helloimkaley]

This is always a good thing! Also, a lot of banks have online access to your bank account where you can get instant updates of whenever anything is taken or put into your bank account. Every day I go on and check mine before going to bed and make sure what pops up I actually spent since I can normally remember the totals. If I have an issue with a specific statement I just ask them for more details and they send it to me. I've caught a few incorrect transactions before.

[Meghan]

Originally Posted by helloimkaley This is always a good thing! Also, a lot of banks have online access to your bank account where you can get instant updates of whenever anything is taken or put into your bank account. Every day I go on and check mine before going to bed and make sure what pops up I actually spent since I can normally remember the totals. If I have an issue with a specific statement I just ask them for more details and they send it to me. I've caught a few incorrect transactions before.

Just gotta be careful with checks written, they don't always show up for a few days to a few weeks.

[Brandi]

I stickied it, but also moved to the financial forum.

[itsalwaysme]

People still use checks?

[Nikolle]

Originally Posted by itsalwaysme People still use checks?

Oh yea, I use them to pay bills mostly.