What is bank reconciliation?
Bank reconciliation is the process of matching your accounting records to your bank statement — making sure every transaction in your books corresponds to a real movement of money.
It's essential for: - Catching errors and fraud early - Knowing your true cash position - Preparing accurate tax returns - Passing audits
The traditional approach (and why it's painful)
Without proper software, reconciliation means: 1. Downloading a bank statement CSV 2. Manually matching each line to a transaction in your accounting system 3. Investigating discrepancies 4. Posting adjusting journal entries
For a business with 200 transactions per month, this can take 4–6 hours.
How Finovo does it in minutes
Step 1: Auto-import Finovo connects to your bank via open banking and imports transactions every day automatically. No CSV downloads needed.
Step 2: AI matching For each bank transaction, Finovo looks for a matching invoice, bill or expense. When it finds one, it suggests the match. You just click confirm.
For transactions without a match (bank charges, direct debits, payroll runs), Finovo auto-categorises them based on the payee and description.
Step 3: Review exceptions Only unmatched or ambiguous transactions need your attention — typically less than 10% of your total volume.
Step 4: Mark as reconciled Once all transactions are matched or categorised, click Reconcile period. Finovo locks the period and produces a reconciliation report.
Tips for faster reconciliation
- Reconcile weekly, not monthly — smaller batches are faster and errors are easier to spot
- Use rules to auto-categorise recurring transactions (payroll, rent, subscriptions)
- Enable bank notifications in Finovo to be alerted to unusual transactions instantly