Changing the Opening Balance

PYohe

How do I change the opening balance? I have read many posts that say to "change it", but no one explains how to change it.

I just switched to Quicken so I have to start from the beginning. I downloaded my bank transactions with a specific starting date. The balance was incorrect.

I changed it to uncleared, then right clicked on the balance entry and tried to "edit" the amount. It did not work.

I clicked on the "amount" to change it manually, then clicked save. I got this message.
"You are recording a transfer back into the same account. Save it anyway?"

If I click YES, it does NOT save the amount. IF I click NO, it just disappears entirely. No more Opening Balance.

Should I create a manual entry for the Opening balance?

Thanks

qkn958

Couldn't you just manually enter a transaction to correct the balance? I think that's what I did and called it 'Adjustment'. Also when you reconcile your account it would fix it. I usually reconcile using online balance because it's much faster.

NotACPA

That "Opening Balance" in an account is a normal transaction with "Opening Balance" as the Payee name and the name of the account itself enclosed in Square Brackets e.g. [Visa].  It can be edited the same as any other transaction.

That Opening Balance can be tricky to calculate.  Start with the statement ending amount from immediately before you created the account in Q, and then ADD to that amount any checks/debits that hadn't posted to the bank as-of the date of the statement and SUBTRACT any unposted deposits.  Add these unposted transactions to the account manually and then be SURE to reconcile the account to the next available statement (NOT the most recent).

PYohe

I understand how to get the opening balance. I was having trouble with changing the amount.
I figured out that it was not disappearing, but it was entering a different date 2 months later. I found the Opening Balance with transactions from March, not at the bottom. I changed the dates and all is well now.

Chris_QPW

qkn958 said:

Couldn't you just manually enter a transaction to correct the balance? I think that's what I did and called it 'Adjustment'. Also when you reconcile your account it would fix it. I usually reconcile using online balance because it's much faster.

Any kind of “adjustment” other that changing the opening balance because it is wrong isn’t “reconciling”.
Reconciling is the process of bring the transactions in your register in agreement with the financial institution’s.

A “Balance Adjustment” whether manually entered or entered by selecting Done in the reconcile window when the balance isn’t zero is just hiding the fact that you didn’t reconcile.

Neither of these fix the core problem, that the transactions in your register don’t match what the financial institution has.

Changing the opening balance is valid when you decide to add more transactions in the past, because you are again doing it to be in agreement with what the financial institution has for that new opening balance date.  If on the other hand you are just changing it because your last reconciled failed then this isn’t any better than doing a balance adjustment.

There is one other case where changing it is right.  There is a bug in Quicken that has been changing the opening balance.  Clearly, if Quicken’s bug is changing a correct opening balance to an incorrect one, then one will want to change it back.

PYohe

I always reconcile. My old program reconciled. I downloaded transactions for my Jan statement, but some were duplicates so I deleted them. It made the balance off.