Obsessive Compulsive Checkbook Balancing
Tip It!When it comes to balancing our books, I’m a Quicken addict. And beyond that, I’m a perfectionist. So whenever I sit down to reconcile our bank statements with our check register and Quicken, I just can’t stand discrepancies. It’s so bad that I’ll spend a ton of time poring over our check register searching for the error that made it fail to agree with Quicken’s bottom line.
In fact, even if I’m absolutely certain that the balance in Quicken is right, I’ll still search out the math error that caused the discrepancy rather than simply correcting the balance in our checkbook. Last night, for example, I was catching up on some bookkeeping and I wound up with a $0.26 difference between Quicken and our checkbook. It took me about twenty minutes, but I was ultimately able to track this back to a simple math error in our check register.
When all was said and done, I actually considered myself to be lucky, as I’ve been known to obsess over things like this for better than an hour. Admittedly, a part of the problem is that I often let things pile up for as long as three months, and then put in a marathon session of getting Quicken back up to speed. Thus, when an error crops up, it can take extra long to pick through and find it.
Published on September 12th, 2005 - 19 Comments
Filed under: Miscellany
About the author: Nickel is the founder and editor-in-chief of this site. He's a thirty-something family man who has been writing about personal finance since 2005, and guess what? He's on Twitter!
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September 12th, 2005 at 6:39 am
This is the reason I dont like quicken or msmoney.
Now I use a excel file, but like a budget.
Something like this:
Spend planned effective income available
house 450 445 1500 76776.32
food 300 223.20
gifts 100 100
… … …
Total 750 768.20 1500
On begin of the month I do the planning for the month, and I track on cell of effective the spend.
Like: =123.21+23.43
Of course Available is the value of the bank balance. In this way, in the begin of the Month I know exact how much money I will need to the month and track if I’m on budget or not.
It works for me (and my wife!!) for 3 years.
Every Quicken tentative fails after 2-3 months.
Nelson
September 12th, 2005 at 8:35 am
I don’t use Quicken/Money anymore because of this. In my post on budgeting money, I make available the excel spreadsheet I use.
September 12th, 2005 at 9:14 am
I use MS Money, and use it as my check register, since I have laser wallet checks that I print from the computer (the advantage of working at a check printing company…)
I try not to use checks more than I have to, anyway, since it is so much safer to use credit. I put all of my charges on the card and pay it off every month. It is an easy way to subtract the credit balance from the bank balance and make sure that there is still a bank balance.
September 12th, 2005 at 9:26 am
Yeah, I hardly write any checks myself. But I still find myself being strangely attracted to keeping track of all transactions on paper as well as in Quicken. Old habits die hard, I guess. Also, the dual-entry system helps find errors (although most errors are on paper, so ditching that probably wouldn’t hurt).
September 12th, 2005 at 5:43 pm
I find the best way is to structure my MS Money time. I used to obsess about it, but I now block off 1/2 hour 2 times per week where I update everything. That is all I spend, except for 2 – 3 times per year when I do some deeper analysis. If I am out anything under $5, I don’t worry about it and move on. Time is too expensive to waste on that amount of money.
Good post, good topic.
The Dividend Guy
September 12th, 2005 at 5:59 pm
nickel…this is me to a “T” as well
I also track ALL cash expenditures and it just burns when I have to allot any discrepancy at all (from 2c to $2) to “misc” grrrr
I could go on, but it’s embarrassing
September 12th, 2005 at 6:06 pm
Fortunately for me, I don’t track individual cash expenditures. Regardless, I’ve managed to balance everything perfectly every month since January of 1997. I guess it’s become a point of (perhaps misguided) pride for me now. After such a run of perfection, I just can’t bear to break the streak.
September 12th, 2005 at 8:10 pm
Ha! I’m just the same way!!! But I don’t often get problems — Quicken is just too good.
September 12th, 2005 at 8:18 pm
Yeah, Quicken is good… But sometimes I’m not!
September 14th, 2005 at 7:47 am
I’m surprised you still use a paper check register if you’re already using Quicken! I just enter the few checks I write in Quicken, and the rest of my transactions are mainly automatic payments that are set up in the “scheduled payments” list. When my checking account statement is available from the bank, I use Quicken’s reconcile feature, which usually highlights any mistakes really easily.
September 20th, 2005 at 2:16 pm
Finally, someone else with the same Quicken obsession disorder (QOD) as me! I keep meaning to stop manually entering things and trust the downloads, but I can never bring myself to do it. I wonder if there is some sort of place where people like us can seek help?
PS If anyone wants the latest version of Quicken, Intuit just sent me some pretty good coupons… I’d be happy to send them to you so that you too can commiserate with us QODers. You can reach me at jelgie [at] gmail.com. I think it’s $10 off but don’t quote me on that.
September 21st, 2005 at 8:19 am
Jamie, I don’t use the auto download features because I want to know every penny that I spend. I do not want to have something downloaded that I am unaware of and just don’t notice; I put everything in by hand. But, I don’t keep a paper register, I just use my computer.
September 21st, 2005 at 8:30 am
I’m the same way about not downloading, as I want to know exactly what’s going on. I’ve eased up a bit on this, though… I now at least download my credit card statements rather than entering every transaction by hand — since we pay in full every month, I used to just track credit cards as a split check with the transactions entered individually in the split. Crazy… I know.
September 23rd, 2005 at 6:32 pm
that IS crazy nickel! LOL
I use the download feature for every account possible (the checking acct stopped working with the de-support of QIF) at LEAST once a week
I’ve also taken to adding a placeholder transaction in the checking account (I put “HOLD” in the check number field) on the date I plan to pay money toward a CC. I update it to match the balance on my CC every time new txns download. This gives me a very clear sense of my checking account cash flow. When I make the payment, I flip the HOLD to say EFT since I pay these online
But I do hand enter all cash txns – usually weekly – from little scraps, notes and receipts. that way I always know the money went toward. Got that from “your money or your life”
September 26th, 2005 at 1:20 am
See, this is why I just don’t track everything through Money, only credit card downloads (and therefore spending). I’d be up all night worrying about 23 cents.
September 26th, 2005 at 3:17 pm
Maybe I’m being ignorant, but spending no more than 15 mins every night and 1/2 hour to 1 hour every weekend should get you reconciled to the penny. Not a lot of time to know where the money is going. Now if I could only do the same with exercising!
December 2nd, 2005 at 11:26 am
I somehow missed this piece when it was originally posted, but saw it on your most frequently discussed list and had to read it. I recently posted about a similar experience and got several “interesting” comments.
However, I really wanted to comment about the following:
“When it comes to balancing our books, I’m a Quicken addict. And beyond that, I’m a perfectionist. So whenever I sit down to reconcile our bank statements with our check register and Quicken, I just can’t stand discrepancies. It’s so bad that I’ll spend a ton of time poring over our check register searching for the error that made it fail to agree with Quicken’s bottom line.
In fact, even if I’m absolutely certain that the balance in Quicken is right, I’ll still search out the math error that caused the discrepancy rather than simply correcting the balance in our checkbook.”
I am the EXACT same way!!!
February 14th, 2006 at 11:13 pm
My wife and I just spent the $19.95 for the YNAB Excel system. Pretty cool stuff! Basically, it works like this. You first save up a month’s worth of expenses (as in money, not in bills you threw in a drawer, LOL). For example, when March 1, 2006 rolls around you already have the money to pay all expenses for March. You can accomplish this with the help of the Primer software (another Excel application). Then, on February 28th (for example), you divy out that money to your expenses for the month of March.
March 13th, 2006 at 12:48 pm
I am very much like you in the perfectionist regard FCN. I could never let something like that go on without fixing it. The way that I got around it is by not using a checkbook. I have not written a single check in about 6 years. I pay all my bills online and give cash for birthdays if needed. It makes life a lot easier and it can all be transferred right into Quicken automatically.