Control Freak

The month is ending tonight. Within 10 days most of us will be receiving bank statements.

I am a control freak about such things. Like with our credit card statements, I do more than review and accept. I match receipts with the credit card statement.

I enter the credit card payment on Quicken splitting the entry by purchase into categories like Auto:Fuel, Auto:Maintenance/Repairs, Entertainment, Clothing, etc. Quicken easily can recall and report how much we spend on gas and how often we eat out or buy tickets to events.

The bank statement can easily be reconciled using Quicken. Because I carefully maintain control of the balance in the checking account, it's simply a matter of ticking off deposits and checks on the computer screen.

Before I had the computer's help, I would sit and check mark each transaction on the statement against the check register. Then, taking the bank's balance, I would add in any deposits happening after the statement cut off date and subtracting checks that had not yet cleared the bank. With luck, that number would coincide with the register balance. It must balance to the penny or I would hunt it down.

Oh, how I love Quicken.

'til later