How to Regularly Balance Your Checkbook

Get your checkbook and ledger book, gather your ATM and deposit receipts and grab a calculator and a pencil. It's time to do some balancing!

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Checkbook Wallets
• Ledger Books
• Calculators
• Financial Calculator
• Bank Account
• Checks
• Spiral Notebooks
• Writing Pens
• Calculators
• Ledger books

Calculate Your Balance

1. Write down your checkbook's current balance at the top of a piece of paper or on the back of your statement (some banks provide a worksheet on the back of each statement for calculating your balance).

2. Subtract amounts for uncleared deposits and bank fees, such as monthly fees or those for (gasp!) bounced checks, and subtract from your calculated total.

3. Add any uncleared checks and the interest you have earned to this figure.

4. Compare the final figure to your bank statement.

Check Your Numbers

5. Separate your returned checks and ATM withdrawal slips into two piles.

6. Put your returned checks in numerical order and compare to your ledger book by putting an "X" in the ledger by every figure that matches a canceled check.

7. Put your ATM withdrawal slips in order by date and compare to your ledger book by putting an "X" in the ledger for every figure that matches an ATM withdrawal.

8. Make final changes in your ledger after comparing your deposit receipts with your bank statement. Put an "X" on your statement by every figure that matches with a deposit receipt.

Tips & Warnings

• If you notice any discrepancies, notify your bank.
• Be wary of misplaced decimals when making calculations.

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on 6/29/2009
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on 1/19/2006 If your error is dividable by 9, look for reversed figures. For instance; you wrote a check for $36, but recorded it as $63, the difference is $27 and is divisible by 9. The result is 3, so look for an error in the tens. $360 mixed with $630 the final result is 30 so look for the error in the hundreds, etc.

on 11/22/2005 If you're off by a certain dollar amount (for example $50.22), try dividing by two ($25.11) and look for a transaction in that amount. Sometimes you accidentally add something instead of subtracting (or vice versa), and this will pinpoint the error.

on 11/22/2005 Unless you are often near overdrawing your account, you can round your figures to the nearest dollar. You won't be off by more than a couple of dollars either way. If you hate adding up all those numbers, try it. I work with numbers and use this method.

on 11/22/2005 When balancing your checkbook, one must be careful not to flip your numbers. For example, you wrote a check of $36 and in your ledger you wrote $63. This is a mistake that happens quite frequently for those of us on the run.