What You Need to Balance a Checkbook

"Hi! This is Summer on behalf of expertvillage.com in this clip we’re going to be going over the items that you’ll need in order to balance your checkbook. The first thing that you’re going to need which is most important is your bank statement, most of them look pretty similar and most banks send the statements out the last day of the month and I usually recommend balancing your checkbook at least once a month that way if something’s not in balance it’s easier to find your mistake than if you were to wait longer. The second thing you’re going to need which is the second most important thing is your checkbook register, now hopefully during the month every time that you write a check or use your debit card, make withdraws or get deposits you’ve been writing all those things in your register, this is also going to make a lot easier when you go to reconcile your checkbook register with what your bank statement shows, that way if there’s a discrepancy between what you have and what the bank has it’s going to be a lot easier to find that and fix it if you need to. Also you may want to have your checkbook with you, I recommend getting checks that have the carbon copy behind it that way every time you write a check out you also have the carbon copy that shows who the check was payable to and what the amount was that way if you didn’t write it in your register when you wrote the check you at least have this copy that you can use when reconciling your checkbook. And also of course you want to have some pens, highlighters, maybe a marker with you and a calculator that way it’s easier and more accurate when you start calculating the amounts and balancing your checkbook. Those are the basic things you need in order to start balancing your checkbook."