Reviewing and approving

Why there's a review

Every statement, whether you uploaded it, your assistant prepared it, or a bank feed brought the month in, stops here first. Nothing from it is in your books until you approve it. EscBooks does the sorting; you check it once.

Open one from any of these:

The account's Statements card, where the month says Waiting for review.
The line under the account's month strip on Accounts: … is waiting for review.
Bring In beside a month on the account's Bank Feed card.
The banner on Expenses, with Review →.

The page

Along the top: the account, the dates the statement covers, how many lines, and the file (click it to download the original) or Prepared by and the assistant's name.
The balances box, to check the statement is complete (see Checking the balances, below).
The tabs: Every line, To add (expenses and refunds), Already recorded and Set aside (what stays out of your books), each with its count.
Each line shows its date, the vendor (with the statement's own text under it), the category, the amount (credits and deposits in green), and a note saying what it is or why it stays out.
The bar along the bottom says what approving will do: how many expenses and their total, the payments between accounts, the lines explained, how many lines stay out, and how many rules it will learn.

What EscBooks already sorted

Vendors and categories are filled in from your vendors, your earlier choices and your import rules. A line a rule caught says Your rule: click it to change the rule. A charge for one of your subscriptions says so, and is linked to it.
Already recorded: an expense you'd entered already (the same amount, within a few days, on this account, or a check by its number), shown beside the line so it isn't added twice. Already recorded as equipment links to the equipment. Already imported means another statement of this account brought it in.
Refunds: a credit on a card is matched to the purchase it refunds, from the same vendor. Matched, it comes ticked, says Of the purchase's amount and date, and counts against that purchase's category. Not matched, it says No purchase found. Tick it to count it against a category.
Card payments and transfers between your own accounts are marked as transfers, not expenses (below).
Deposits into a bank account are matched to client payments you've recorded on invoices, where they add up (below).
Lines your rules mark personal, or leave out, say so: Personal, by your rule or Left out by your rule.
On a bank feed month, a line the bank takes back after sending it (a charge reversed, a duplicate it corrected) is set aside and marked The bank took this back, so it isn't approved by mistake. If the month was already approved, the line says so too: check its expense against your next statement, and delete it if it isn't there.

Adding and leaving out lines

Every line has one menu that says what it is, the same whether the line is ticked or not. For money out: an Expense category, a Transfer between your accounts, or Not an expense (the owner's money, a returned deposit, a payroll's payment). Choosing one puts the line in your books as that, and ticks it. To change it, choose another.
A ticked line goes into your books; an unticked one stays out (personal spending on a business card, say). The tick says only that. Ticking a charge on its own adds it as an expense in the category EscBooks suggested. Unticking a line takes it back out, asking first when it was matched or marked; it never turns it into something else.
A payment between your accounts shows the other account in place of the menu; untick it, or click Not a transfer, and the menu is back.
Ticked lines go into your books when you approve. To add one now, use Add Now (the + on a ticked charge or refund): it's added as approving would add it, split if you split it, and shows Added. Undo under it takes it back out until you approve. Approving adds the rest, and discarding the statement takes back what you added from it.
Change a ticked line's vendor or category right on the line, and Remember for next time appears under it, already ticked: next month's line from that vendor arrives the same way. Untick it for a one-off.
Untick a line EscBooks meant to add, and Always leave out appears, unticked: tick it to leave that charge out of every statement from now on.
Either way, the rule is learned when you approve, and the bar counts it (… rules for next time).
Add a Rule (the wand on a charge) makes a rule from its words: Statement text contains, then Bring it in (with a Vendor and Category), Personal or Leave it out. Every other line on the statement that holds those words follows it at once, and every statement after. All your rules goes to Import Rules.
A charge you leave out can still be recorded as owner money under What is this?, such as an Owner draw (an Owner distribution, or a Dividend or distribution, for a partnership or corporation) for personal spending the business paid for (see Owner money).
A charge set to Payroll or Officer salary says which is which under its category: Wages to your employees, or Your pay as an officer, through payroll (a corporation's owner).
A payroll provider's lines (Gusto's NET and TAX, say) are matched to the payroll they pay: Matched to payroll. One with no payroll recorded yet waits as Payroll: record this payroll, with Record Payroll beside it. The provider's fee stays an expense, as Fees (see Payroll).

Splitting a charge

Split This Charge (on a ticked charge) divides one line, like a warehouse run that's partly supplies and partly personal.

Give each part its amount and its category, client and project, and tick Bill to the client where it's billable. A Note is optional.
Tick Personal for a part that wasn't the business's: it's recorded as an owner draw (or distribution) from this account.
Add a Part for more, up to 20. The parts must add up to the charge exactly (the dialog says what's left to split), and at least one must be the business's. Then Save Split.
The line shows Split 2 ways (or more) with its parts. Change Split and Undo Split are on the line until you approve.

Each business part becomes its own expense when you approve. A charge already in your books can be split too: see Expenses.

Transfers and card payments

Paying your card from checking, or moving money to savings, isn't spending. EscBooks marks those lines as transfers between your own accounts, so each is recorded once, on both sides.

On a card statement, the payment says Card payment, and needs the bank account it came from: pick it under From…. With only one bank account, it's picked for you. With none yet, the page says to add it in Accounts first.
On a bank statement, a transfer that names your other account (or that the other account's statement already recorded) is matched to it. One EscBooks can't place says Payment or transfer: pick the other account under What is this?, in Transfer between your accounts.
Payment recorded means the other account's statement already recorded the same transfer, so it isn't recorded twice.
Marked as a transfer by mistake? Untick it, or click Not a transfer. On an approved statement, that asks first, then removes the transfer.
A credit on a card that's really a payment, but wasn't spotted? In its menu, pick the bank account under Card payment.

Approving waits until every card payment and transfer has its other account: the bar says Pick where the card payment came from or Pick the other account for the transfer.

Deposits and client payments

Money into a bank account is usually a client paying an invoice. EscBooks matches a deposit to the payments you recorded when it can (one payment, or retainer deposit, of the same amount from the days around it; or one client's payments on the same day that add up to it) and marks it Client payment, with the invoices beside it. Change picks others; Undo takes the match off.

Not matched, but a payment you recorded or an open invoice is exactly the deposit's amount? A Match invoice card under the deposit names the invoice and client, and says what clicking it does: link the payment already recorded, or record the payment on the invoice, dated the deposit.
Not matched? Under What is this?, choose Client payments…. Match Client Payments opens with the amount to match in a box at the top (the deposit, less any part of it that went back out), then Recorded payments from around then: tick the ones the deposit is (one, or several, such as a check for two invoices), then Match Payment (or Match 2 Payments).
A payment you haven't recorded yet? Under Record a payment, pick the Invoice, check the Payment amount, and click Record Payment. It's recorded as a bank deposit on the deposit's date.
Card payments often arrive with the processor's fee taken out. When the payments come to more than the deposit, the difference is recorded as a Fees expense from this account, so your income stays whole and the fee counts as a cost. When the difference is more than a processor usually keeps (about 6%), it's likelier the wrong payment: the dialog says so, and matches only once you tick A processor kept …. Payments that come to less than the deposit can't be matched until the rest is recorded.
When one open invoice owes exactly what's left to match, it's already picked under Record a payment. After part of a deposit is marked returned, the deposit's line offers that invoice as a Match invoice card too.
Money that isn't from a client can be owner money instead, under Money in: Owner contribution (a Capital contribution for a corporation) or Loan from owner (a Shareholder loan; a sole proprietor can't lend to themselves). See Owner money.
Money that's income but not a client's payment goes under Income with no invoice: Platform payout… (what YouTube, Patreon, an affiliate program or a book platform paid you, with any fees it kept), Interest income (interest the bank paid the business), Sale without an invoice (a sale nobody invoiced) or Other income. Approving records it on Income, as other income on the deposit's date, into this account, linked to the line. See Invoicing and getting paid.
A deposit worded like a platform's payout offers it under What is this?, like Payout from YouTube? for a Google deposit that names YouTube. See Creators and authors.
Income you recorded before the statement came in (by hand, or by approving your assistant's request) is offered as Already recorded: under the deposit it may be: the same amount deposited, within a week, into this account or none yet. Click it to match the deposit to it instead of recording it again.
Money out has the same menu: under Not an expense, Owner draw (Owner distribution for a partnership or S corporation, Dividend or distribution for a C corporation), Loan repaid to owner (Shareholder loan repayment) and Reimbursement to owner.
Money that came in and went back out (a bounced check, a payment the client stopped or recalled, a reversed wire) is a Returned deposit…, under Not an expense. Pick the deposit it took back, from this statement or an earlier one of the account. The two lines cancel out: neither is income or an expense. When only part went back, such as a wire for two invoices with one stopped because it was already paid, match what stayed to its client payments next: Match Client Payments counts the returned part toward the deposit. Mark the return first; a deposit already matched in full is taken back out with Undo before part of it can be returned.

A deposit isn't counted as income twice: the income is the invoice payment you already recorded. The deposit just says which account it went into. Marked as other income, the deposit is the income: there's no payment behind it (a platform payout's gross is the deposit and its fees together). Matched to income already recorded, it's counted once. Lines can be explained this way after approving too; it's recorded at once, and Undo takes it back out.

Checking the balances

Enter the Opening balance and Closing balance printed on the statement (on a card, the Previous balance and New balance). EscBooks checks that the lines take one to the other:

Ties out: these lines take the one balance to the other. Every line on the statement is here.
Off by an amount: a line may be missing or doubled, or a balance mistyped. Compare the statement with the list: the amount it's off by is often one line's.

Every line counts, ticked or not: a personal charge you leave out is still on the statement. The one exception is a line the bank took back: it was never on the statement, so it isn't counted, and the check says so under its result. Last month's closing balance is offered as this month's opening one (Your last statement closed at …, with Use it). The balances can be entered before or after approving. On an account added by hand, the latest approved closing balance becomes the account's balance; on a connected account, the bank's own balance leads (until the feed goes 7 days without syncing), and the statement's closing balance is what it reconciles to. On the account, a statement that ties out shows Reconciled, and one that doesn't says what it's off by.

Try it: a statement whose file has every line, one missing, or one twice.

The statement is for

The file has

Previous balance$1,204.16

Sep 1Adobe Creative Cloud+$59.99
Sep 2Blue Bottle Coffee+$18.50
Sep 3Payment, thank you−$1,204.16
Sep 5Juniper Print Co.+$212.40
Sep 8Costco+$186.35
Sep 12Netflix (left out as personal)+$15.49
Sep 16Figma (already recorded)+$45.00
Sep 24Blue Bottle Coffee+$22.75

The lines take it to$560.48

New balance, as printed$560.48

Ties out: these lines take $1,204.16 to $560.48.

On a card the balance is what you owe: each charge adds to it, and the payment takes it down. Every line counts, ticked or not: the 8 lines here come to −$643.68.

Approving

Check the bar at the bottom: how many expenses (and refunds), their total, the payments between accounts, the deposits explained, and how many lines stay out.
Click Add (it says how many, like Add 5 Expenses), or Approve when there's nothing to add but transfers or deposits. If something still needs an answer, like the bank account a card payment came from, the bar says what.

Approving adds each ticked line as an expense on the account, records the transfers, deposits and owner money, learns the rules you asked it to remember, and fills in the month on the account's strip. You're taken back to the account, where the statement says what it brought in.

Discard throws the whole import away: nothing is added. An uploaded file is removed, to upload again whenever you like; an assistant can send the statement again. A bank feed month's lines go back to the account's Bank Feed card, to bring in again whenever you're ready.

Your accountant, and anyone with read-only access, can open a statement and read every line, but can't change or approve it.