Module · Bank statement

Where to find it in the app

• Use it: Finance → Bank statement
• Turn it on/off: your business name (top-left) → Settings → Modules → Finance → Bank statement

Plan: Solo and Business · Module group: Finance · Navigation: Finance → Bank statement

1. Overview

Purpose. The first thing an accountant asks at the end of the year is whether what you recorded agrees with the bank. This screen answers it. You bring in your business account's statement, and each line is ticked off against what HappierBiz already knows: an invoice that was paid, an expense on the business card, a bill you settled, a staff member you reimbursed. What is left is the short list your accountant actually asks about.

Any file your bank gives you. A CSV, OFX (also called QFX or QBO) or QIF export from online banking reads straight away, whatever the bank. A PDF of the statement, or photos of a paper statement's pages, are read by AI and shown to you line by line to check before anything is imported.

Every import is checked against the bank's own balances. Where the file carries a running balance, each line's balance has to follow from the one before, and a PDF has to take its opening balance to its closing balance. When they do not, the screen names the row to check before you import, so a missing or misread line is caught at the door.

It is not a live bank feed. Nothing connects to your bank. You export the file yourself and choose to bring it in, so the only thing HappierBiz keeps is the lines of a statement you already have.

It records what you decided. It never decides tax treatment. Whether a line is income, deductible or carries GST is your registered tax agent's call. An expense you record from a line is an ordinary expense claim, with the GST field left for you to fill or not, exactly as on the Expenses screen.

2. When to use it

• You are paid by bank transfer, or you spend on a business debit or credit card, and want the bank's version of events held against your own.
• Your accountant has asked for a reconciled year, or for "the deposits you can't explain".
• You want to catch what you forgot to record: a payment that never went against its invoice, a subscription that never became an expense.
• Your BAS is due and you want every purchase on the card recorded, with its tax invoice, before the figures are worked out.

3. Required permissions

Managers and payroll officers have both. Staff and supervisors have neither: a bank statement is the most private document a business has. Recording a line with a receipt waiting in the receipts inbox also needs Approve expenses.

4. Navigation path

Finance → Bank statement. Each financial year is a chip along the top; All years shows everything on record. With more than one account, a chip for each account sits under the years, and the figures follow the account you choose. Below the figures, To look at, Explained, Set aside and All filter the list, and the search box finds a line by its words, its date or its amount.

5. What you'll see

Three figures for the year. To look at counts the lines nobody has decided yet, with the money in and out they add up to. Explained counts the lines matched to a record or recorded as one. Set aside counts lines that are not the business's income or spending: personal, transfers, tax, payroll, loans and card takings. None of them is a tax figure.

The lines, month by month. Each shows the bank's date, the bank's description, the amount (money in shown in green) and what it is: still to look at, or what explained it and who decided. Beside a line still to look at you may see:

• Looks like, the one record HappierBiz holds of the same amount within the matching window, with a button to accept it.
• Like a date, what you did with the same payee's line last time, with a button to do it again.
• A receipt waiting in your receipts inbox from the supplier the line names.
• An expense from the same supplier with a different amount.
• What the bank's words suggest: a payment to the ATO, wages, a loan, a transfer, card takings paid out, or the bank's own fee on a foreign purchase.

Imports. The statements brought in so far, with the account, the dates covered, how many lines were new and how many were already here, and the kind of file.

6. Turning it on

Your business name (top left) → Settings → Modules → Finance → Bank statement. Solo and Business plans both include it.

7. Step-by-step tasks

7a. Get the statement from your bank

In your online banking, open the business account, find Export or Download transactions, choose the date range and a format. Any of these works:

OFX is the most reliable choice where your bank offers it: it names every value, so nothing has to be worked out. A month or a quarter at a time keeps the list short. Older statements are often only available as a PDF; that is fine too, see 7c.

7b. Import a CSV, OFX or QIF file

1. Finance → Bank statement → Import a statement.
2. Choose a file, or paste the lines straight from a spreadsheet.
3. Which account. Your own name for it, such as Everyday account. Use the same name every time: a re-import skips lines already here for that account, so overlapping exports add nothing twice. A file whose lines are already here under a different account name is refused and names that account, so a statement cannot come in twice under two names. Choose the account's currency beside it if it is not Australian dollars; a file that names its currency fills it in.
4. How the file was read. For a CSV, one sentence says which column became the date, the description, the amount and the balance, and which way round the dates are. Change anything that is wrong. An OFX or QIF file names every value, so there is nothing to choose, apart from which way round a QIF file's dates are. For a credit card statement that shows purchases as positive figures, tick This is a credit card statement so purchases become money out. When most lines read as money in, the screen suggests it.
5. The balance check. When the file carries a running balance, the screen says Every line's balance follows from the line before, so nothing is missing, or names the row where a balance does not follow, which means a line is missing from the export or a column was read wrongly. When the balances only add up with every amount the other way round, it says so: money in and money out are swapped, or it is a credit card statement.
6. Check the first lines and the totals underneath, then Import. Rows that cannot be read (an opening balance row, usually) are named before you import, not dropped in silence. Lines of account details above the header row (an account name, a BSB) are recognised and skipped, and so is the opening balance a QIF file carries as its first transaction.

You can import as often as you like, for any date range. A line already here is skipped when it has the same date, amount, description and running balance. It is also skipped when the bank reworded it between exports, or when the same days come in as a different kind of file (an OFX after a CSV): the same day and amount in the same account, with the same running balance, or without one, the same payee. Two lines with different running balances are always two lines. The count of lines already here is shown after each import.

7c. Import a PDF statement or photos of one

1. Import a statement → Choose a file, and choose the statement's PDF, or photos of its pages (JPEG or PNG, up to 10 at a time, in page order).
2. HappierBiz sends the file to its AI provider to read the lines. A long statement can take a minute or two. The file is deleted from HappierBiz as soon as it has been read; only the lines come back.
3. Check the lines. Every line the statement printed is listed, with its date, description and amount, each one correctable. Above them:
   • The statement's own proof. When the statement prints opening and closing balances, the screen says whether the opening balance and every line come to the closing balance. When they do not, it says by how much and names the row whose printed balance does not follow, so you know which line to check against the statement.
   • Any line that could not be read is counted, so you can add it from the statement with Add a line.
   • Remove a line that is not a transaction with ×.
4. Name the account and Import. The lines go through exactly the same checks as a CSV, so the same statement imported twice, as a PDF and then as a CSV, adds nothing twice.

Reading a PDF or photos uses one of your business's monthly AI allowance. Money out is shown negative; on a credit card statement, purchases are money out and payments money in. Tick This is a credit card statement if the reader did not, so the balance check treats the balance as what is owed.

7d. Look at a line

Every line starts as To look at. Open one with Look and choose:

• Looks like / Match. A record HappierBiz already has of the same amount, within 90 days before or 20 days after the bank's date. A payment already recorded, an expense on the card, a bill marked paid, a reimbursement, or an asset under Equipment bought for that amount. Matching only links the two. An expense in another currency is offered too, see 7g.
• Record the payment. The line pays an invoice that is still owing. HappierBiz records the payment in the invoice's ledger, dated the bank's date, and the invoice becomes paid or part paid. No receipt is emailed: the customer paid weeks ago and the invoice already lists its payments.
• Mark the bill paid. The line settles a bill in Expenses → To pay. The bill is marked paid on the bank's date.
• Record it paid back. The line is the business paying a staff member back for a claim in Expenses → Owed back to the team. The claim is marked paid back by bank transfer on the bank's date, and the staff member is emailed to say so. A claim paid back in a pay run is not offered here: it went out inside their wages.
• This line paid several records. One transfer that paid two invoices, one payment back to a staff member for four claims, one BPAY for two bills. Tick the records it paid; they have to come to the line to the cent. An invoice still owing can take part of the line, so a customer's part payment fits. For money out, what is left over can be recorded as an expense, such as a fee the bank took from the payment. Opening the line again puts back every bill and claim it marked paid. Invoice payments it recorded stay on their invoices, and an expense it recorded for the rest stays in Expenses.
• Record it with a receipt from your inbox. When a receipt waiting in the receipts inbox names the supplier this line names, the line says so. Recording the line with it makes one expense: the bank's figure, the receipt's file, and the receipt's own currency when it was not Australian dollars. Filing that receipt separately as well would put the purchase in the books twice.
• Record it as an expense. Money out with no record yet. Pick one of your own categories, say what it was for, add the GST if you know it, and attach the receipt or tax invoice if you have it. An approved expense on the business card lands in Expenses dated the bank's date, with the file attached. Money out that bought equipment you keep is not an expense: add it under Operations → Equipment with its cost, GST and invoice, then match the line to it. It appears under Looks like once the amounts agree.
• Set it aside. A line that is not the business's income or spending, with the reason: Personal, not the business (spending that was personal, or the owner's own money in or out), Transfer between your own accounts (including paying the business credit card), Card takings paid out (a payout from Stripe or your card terminal provider: the sales inside it are counted where they were taken, so counting the payout too would count the money twice), Tax paid to or refunded by the ATO, Wages or super, through payroll, Loan or finance, or Other, with a note.
• Remove this line. For a line that should not be on the statement at all, such as a second copy of a line the bank reworded between two exports. A line that looks like one is marked Possibly the same as the line from ... with a button to remove it. Only an open or set aside line can be removed.

A line already decided shows Change, which opens it again. Opening a line again puts back anything the match changed: a bill it marked paid is unpaid again, and an expense it gave the bank's figure goes back to its own. A payment or an expense the line recorded stays in the books; remove it from Invoicing or Expenses if it was wrong, and the line goes back to To look at on its own (see 7i).

7e. Do it like last time

Most of a statement is the same payees every month. When a line's payee was dealt with before, the line says Like that day and what was done: Supplies, Printer paper, GST included, or Set aside: Transfer between your own accounts.

• Record it again records the expense the same way: the same category, the same words, and the GST as an eleventh of the amount when last time's GST was an eleventh. When last time's GST was only part of the total (a docket with GST free items), the line opens for you to check the GST instead.
• Set aside again sets it aside for the same reason, with the same note.

The payee is recognised by the words that name it, so "VISA PURCHASE OFFICEWORKS 0123 BRISBANE" and "OFFICEWORKS 0456 BRISBANE AU" are the same payee. Money in and money out are kept apart, so a refund is never recorded as a purchase. Nothing is done until you press the button, and nothing needs setting up: it learns from what you decide. A category you have since renamed or removed is not suggested.

7f. Accept every suggestion at once

When lines are waiting with a suggestion beside them, Accept N suggestions at the top of To look at takes them all: each record beside a line is matched (or its payment recorded, its bill marked paid), and each line like last time is done again. A confirmation says how many and how many record a payment first. Each line is decided exactly as its own button would, so one somebody decided in the meantime, or whose record changed, is skipped and named, and the rest go on. Lines with a receipt waiting in the inbox, or an expense of another amount from the same supplier, are left for you to look at. Any of them can be opened again with Change.

7g. Receipts in another currency

A receipt in US dollars and the bank line for it never agree to the cent: the bank charged Australian dollars at its own rate. HappierBiz handles it the way the accounting packages do on their multi-currency plans.

• Record the receipt in its own currency. In Expenses, or when filing from the receipts inbox, choose the currency beside the amount and enter the figure on the receipt. The Australian figure is filled from the Reserve Bank's rate for the receipt's date, which is the rate the ATO itself uses. Type over it if you know what your card was charged.
• Match the bank line. The expense is put beside its line when the bank prints the same foreign amount in the description, or when the description names the supplier and the line is within six per cent of the estimate. A line within six per cent that does not name the supplier lists the expense when you open it, but does not suggest it: another subscription of about the same price is as likely. Matching it replaces the estimate with the bank's exact figure, so the books carry what actually left the account.
• Receipts filed before currencies existed. A US$20 receipt filed as $20 shows under Same supplier, different amount when the bank's description names the supplier. Choose The receipt was in and the currency, and the expense takes the bank's figure with its currency recorded. The amount on it was wrong does the same for an Australian expense with a mistyped figure. From Expenses, the Currency link on a row corrects one without a bank line.
• The bank's own fee. Most banks charge about three per cent on a foreign purchase, as a line of its own beside it. It is marked as the bank's fee; record it as an expense. If you keep a category for bank fees, the line offers to record it there in one click.

7h. A statement from an account in another currency

A business that keeps a US dollar account, such as a Wise account, can import its statement too. Choose the account's currency beside its name when importing; a statement whose file says its currency (Wise's does, and so does every OFX file) fills it in. One account keeps one currency, so an Australian statement under a US dollar account's name is refused.

Its lines are in that currency. They are matched only to expenses and bills in the same currency, by their own total, never to Australian records. Recording one of its lines as an expense records it in that currency, with its Australian figure at the Reserve Bank rate for the day unless you type the figure. A receipt filed in Australian dollars that was really this purchase can be put in the line's currency from Same supplier, different amount. Totals keep each currency apart.

7i. When a record a line explains is removed

The bank line and the record it explains are kept in step, the way Xero keeps a reconciled transaction and its statement line together:

• Deleting an expense recorded from a line or matched to one, under Expenses, puts the line back under To look at, and Expenses says so.
• Voiding an invoice payment a line recorded or matched, under Invoicing, puts the line back, and the invoice is owing again.
• Deleting an asset a line was matched to puts the line back.
• Changing an asset's cost while a line is matched to it is refused: open the line again first, so the two cannot disagree.
• A record that is one of several a line explains cannot be deleted or voided from its own screen: open that line again on the Bank statement first, which puts back what it changed on the others.

7j. Remove an import

Imports → Remove this import takes a statement's lines off the screen. It is refused while any of its lines has recorded a payment or an expense, explains several records, or gave an expense the bank's figure: open those again first, so nothing in the books points at a line that is gone.

8. The ATO and your bank statement

The ATO does not take your bank statement, and HappierBiz does not send it anything. What the ATO asks is that your records explain every transaction, are kept for five years, and back up what you claim. A reconciled statement is how you show that.

• Keeping records. Bank statements are records the ATO asks you to keep for five years, on paper or electronically. Keep the statements from your bank; the lines here, with what you decided each one was and who decided, are the working record your accountant reads, and the CSV download carries all of it.
• GST credits need a tax invoice over $82.50. A bank line shows that money left the account, not what was bought or how much GST it carried. To claim a GST credit on a purchase over $82.50 (GST included), you need the supplier's tax invoice. When you record an expense from a line with GST on it over that amount and no file attached, the screen reminds you. Attach the tax invoice there, or forward it to your receipts inbox and it will offer to attach itself to the expense.
• Your BAS. The BAS worksheet on Accounting & reports works from your records, not from the bank lines: the invoices, payments and expenses the lines are matched to or recorded as. A bill marked paid from its line is paid on the bank's date, which is the date a cash basis BAS counts it in. Recording what the statement shows you forgot is what makes the worksheet complete.
• Payments to and from the ATO (your BAS, PAYG or income tax, by BPAY or transfer) are not running expenses. The line says it looks like a payment to the ATO; set it aside as tax, and your accountant works out what it covered.
• Wages and super paid from the account are recorded in your payroll. Set those lines aside as payroll, so they are not recorded a second time as expenses.
• Personal spending on the business account is set aside as personal, so it is never counted as a business expense.

9. How it works with the rest of HappierBiz

10. Examples

A deposit with the invoice number in it. Direct Credit J SMITH INV-0042, $450.00. Invoice INV-0042 is still owing $450.00, so Looks like names it. One click records the payment and the invoice becomes paid.

A card purchase nobody recorded. VISA PURCHASE OFFICEWORKS, $89.00. Nothing in HappierBiz has that amount. Record it as an expense, category Supplies, GST $8.09, with the tax invoice attached, and it is in Expenses with the bank's date. Next month's Officeworks line says Like that day, Supplies, GST included, and Record it again records it the same way.

The quarterly BAS payment. TAX OFFICE PAYMENTS NETBANK BPAY 75556, $1,840.00. The line says it looks like a payment to the ATO. Set it aside as tax.

A Stripe payout. STRIPE PAYMENTS AU, $1,240.00. The screen points out it looks like a payout. Set it aside as card takings; the card payments inside it are already under Payments, and Reconcile with Stripe on the Accounting screen ties the payout to them.

A coffee on the business card. Set it aside as Personal, not the business. It stays on the record with that decision beside it, which is what an accountant wants to see.

A software subscription billed in US dollars. The receipt says US$20.00 and was filed in Expenses in USD, estimated at A$28.85. The bank line reads VERCEL INC. COVINA US, $29.31 with a separate INTERNATIONAL TRANSACTION FEE, $0.88. Looks like names the expense; matching it sets the expense to A$29.31. The fee line is recorded as its own expense.

11. Reports & exports

CSV downloads every line in the period, oldest first: date, account, currency, description, money in, money out, balance, status, what explained it, the note and who decided. Statuses are in plain words. The last two rows say who prepared it and that it records decisions, not tax treatment. Hand it to your accountant with the Profit and loss and the BAS worksheet from the Accounting screen.

12. Common mistakes

• Two names for one account. Everyday one month and Everyday account the next are two accounts to HappierBiz, so overlapping exports are not skipped. Pick a name and keep it.
• Dates the wrong way round. A file of dates that all fit both readings (every day is 12 or under) is read day first. If the preview's dates look a month out, change Dates are before importing.
• Importing past a balance warning. A balance that does not follow means a line is missing or misread. Export the period again, or correct the line in a PDF's review, before importing.
• Matching the wrong thing. Two records of the same amount a day apart get no Looks like, on purpose. Open the line and pick.
• Recording a payment twice. If you already marked the invoice paid under Invoicing, the line will find that payment and offer to match it. Do not also record a new one.
• Reconciling in Xero by creating the payment again. A payment recorded here that went to Xero is already on the invoice there. In Xero's bank feed, match the deposit to it rather than creating a new receive money transaction.
• Recording equipment as an expense. A van, a laptop or a machine the business keeps belongs under Equipment, not in Expenses. Add it under Operations → Equipment with its cost, then match the line to it.
• Recording a foreign receipt's line as a new expense. If the receipt is already in Expenses, match the line to it instead, or the purchase is in the books twice. Look under Same supplier, different amount first.
• Recording wages or the BAS payment as an expense. Set those aside as payroll or tax: they are recorded elsewhere, and as expenses they would be counted twice.

13. Troubleshooting

• "Nothing new: all lines were already here." The same statement, or an overlapping one, under the same account name, in any of the formats. Nothing was added, nothing needs undoing.
• A line I know is an invoice payment has no suggestion. The amount must agree to the cent and the invoice must be within a year, or the recorded payment within 90 days before or 20 days after the bank's date. A part payment matches nothing automatically: open the line and choose the invoice; a part payment is recorded against it.
• "The books are locked up to..." The line is dated inside a period an owner has closed off under Settings → Invoice & tax details. Recording into it is refused, as everywhere else.
• A US dollar expense is not suggested beside its line. The line has to carry the same foreign amount in its description, or name the supplier and be within six per cent of the expense's estimate. Open the line: the expense may be in the list, or under Same supplier, different amount.
• A PDF says it needs migration 520. The database has not had the update that keeps statement files private while they are read. Export a CSV, OFX or QIF in the meantime; whoever runs your HappierBiz setup runs the migration once.
• "That statement is too long to read in one go." Read a month at a time, or export a CSV, OFX or QIF for the whole period.
• A pasted list reads as one column. Paste the rows as they come out of the spreadsheet, with the heading row; tabs, commas and semicolons between the cells all read.
• The page says migration 486 is needed. The module is on but the database has not had its tables yet. Whoever runs your HappierBiz setup runs it once.

14. Error messages