How do I reconcile a bank account in MONA?
Go to Finance, then Books, then Reconcile. Pick the account, enter the statement date and ending balance, tick what cleared, and finish when the difference is 0.00.
Quick answer: go to Finance, then Books, then Reconcile. Pick the account, enter the statement ending date and ending balance from your bank statement, tick every transaction that appears on the statement, and click Finish when the difference reads 0.00.
What reconciling does
Reconciling is the check that your books match your bank. You take the statement your bank sent, tell MONA what it says, and tick off each transaction the bank actually processed. When the difference is zero, the ledger and the statement agree, and the ticked transactions are locked so nothing can drift afterwards.
Your accountant asks for this because a ledger nobody reconciled is an opinion. A reconciled month is a fact.
How do I reconcile a statement?
- Click Finance in the sidebar, then the Books tab, then Reconcile.
- Pick the account in the Account dropdown. MONA shows when it was last reconciled and at what balance.
- Enter the Statement ending date and the Statement ending balance, exactly as your statement prints them. Beginning balance is filled in from your last completed reconciliation, and is zero the first time.
- Click Start reconciling.
- Tick each transaction that appears on the statement. Bank feed rows are pre-ticked for you. Use Clear all or Unclear all to handle a whole column at once.
- Watch the Difference in the header strip. It turns green at 0.00.
- Click Finish.
You can stop part way through and come back. Nothing posts and nothing locks until you finish, and Discard throws the in-progress reconciliation away without touching a single transaction.
Reading the header strip
| Figure | What it means |
|---|---|
| Beginning balance | Where the last completed reconciliation left this account. Zero on your first one. |
| Cleared in | Total of the ticked deposits (payments, on a card). |
| Cleared out | Total of the ticked payments (charges, on a card). |
| Cleared balance | Beginning balance plus cleared in, minus cleared out. |
| Statement ending balance | What you typed off the statement. |
| Difference | Statement ending balance minus cleared balance. Finish unlocks at 0.00. |
Every figure comes from the ledger. MONA never rounds or estimates a reconciliation number.
The difference is not zero. Now what?
Check these in order:
- A transaction on the statement is missing from MONA. Open the Bank inbox and categorize it, then come back. Only posted transactions can be ticked.
- Something ticked has not really cleared. A check you wrote in August that the vendor deposits in September belongs in next month's statement. Untick it.
- The ending balance has a typo. Discard and start again with the right figure.
- A duplicate. A purchase entered by hand and also captured by the bank feed shows up twice. Fix it in the ledger, then reconcile.
If a small gap survives all four, click Finish anyway. MONA posts an adjusting entry for exactly that amount to Reconciliation Discrepancies, dated on the statement date. Your accountant will see it, which is the point, and undoing the reconciliation reverses it.
Credit cards
Pick Credit Card / Clearing and enter the balance owed as the statement prints it, as a positive number. The two columns are labelled Payments and Charges because a card statement counts up as you spend. MONA applies the sign for you, so a zero difference means the same thing it does on a bank account.
What locks when you finish
Every ticked line becomes reconciled. A reconciled line cannot be edited or deleted, and neither can the journal entry it belongs to. To change one, open the reconciliation and click Undo, make the change, and reconcile the statement again. Undo is available on the most recent completed reconciliation for an account, and only when nothing else is open on it.
The report
A completed reconciliation keeps a report: the summary figures, the transactions that cleared, and the ones still outstanding as of the statement date. Export CSV hands the whole thing to your bookkeeper. The history list under the Start card holds every reconciliation on the account, newest first.
What this does not do yet
- No statement PDF or CSV import. You enter the date and ending balance by hand.
- No auto-matching of a statement line to a ledger line by amount. Bank feed rows are pre-ticked, which covers most of it.
- No ledger account per connected card. All card spend posts to one Credit Card / Clearing account, so several cards reconcile as one balance.
- No reconciliation status in a QuickBooks export. The reconciliation lives in MONA.
If any of those is blocking your bookkeeper, tell us and we will prioritize it.
Related
Want a hand?
If your bookkeeper wants to walk through the first reconciliation with us, book 30 minutes with the founder at calendly.com/mona-justin/30min and bring them along.
Frequently asked questions
What if the difference is not zero?
Work the list first: a transaction on the statement that is not in MONA yet, a line ticked that has not cleared the bank, a typo in the ending balance, or a duplicate. If a small gap remains, click Finish anyway. MONA posts an adjusting entry for exactly the difference to Reconciliation Discrepancies, dated on the statement date. It is a real journal entry your accountant will see, and undoing the reconciliation reverses it.
Why is a line already ticked when I start?
Because it came from your bank feed. The bank already has it, so MONA pre-ticks it as cleared. Manual and journal entries are left unticked for you to confirm against the statement, and you can untick anything MONA pre-ticked.
Can I undo a reconciliation?
Yes. Open it from the history and click Undo. Every line unlocks, any adjusting entry is reversed, and the reconciliation stays in your history marked Undone. You can undo only the most recent completed reconciliation for an account, and only when nothing else is open on it.
How do I reconcile a credit card balance?
Pick Credit Card / Clearing and enter the balance owed as the statement prints it, as a positive number. The columns read Payments and Charges instead of Deposits and Payments. MONA handles the sign, so a zero difference means the same thing as on a bank account.
Does MONA import my statement PDF or match lines automatically?
Not yet. You enter the statement date and ending balance by hand and tick the lines. Bank feed transactions are pre-ticked, which covers most of the work on a connected account.
My bank accounts are all one account in MONA. Is that a problem?
Reconciliation runs over MONA ledger accounts, not over each connected bank. All card spend posts to one Credit Card / Clearing account today, so several cards reconcile as one balance. If your bookkeeper needs a ledger account per card or per bank, tell us.
What happens to reconciled transactions?
They are locked. A reconciled line cannot be edited or deleted, and neither can its journal entry. That is what lets an accountant trust a signed-off month. Undo the reconciliation if you have to change one.
Can I ask the MONA agent to reconcile for me?
Yes. Ask which accounts can be reconciled, start a reconciliation, ask for the current difference, or tick lines. The agent will not finish with a non-zero difference unless you explicitly tell it to post the adjustment, and it will not undo one unless you ask.
Do I still need QuickBooks for reconciliation?
No. From your cutover date forward you reconcile each statement in MONA. Reconciliations you already completed in QuickBooks stay there as history.