August 09, 2023
Article
Although Xero typically has a live bank feed which connects to your bank account, this doesn’t always mean that it is correct or agrees to your bank statements. This needs to be manually checked at least once a year, but ideally, I would check each time you go to submit a VAT return. This will save you time in the long run identifying the source of the issue.
To check this you need to either click on ‘manage account’ within the bank reconciliation screen, or on the three vertical dots to the right of your bank account on the dashboard screen. After this you will need to select ‘reconciliation report’. You can then select the date that you wish to check, and this will produce something similar to the below. The ‘statement balance’ is the figure that should agree to your bank statements and, if everything is reconciled correctly, then the ‘balance in Xero’ should agree to this as well.
Every 90 days you will have to refresh your bank feed which links your bank statements through to Xero. Unfortunately, there is no way around this as it is a legal requirement for the reauthorisation to happen.
Xero will typically give you several prompts when the link has expired such as the example below taken from a dashboard screen. If you click ‘renew bank connection’ this will then redirect you to your online banking where you can log-in with your online banking details.
If you find an issue with duplicate entries on the bank feed then these can be removed by going on to the ‘bank statements’ tab within the bank reconciliation screen and ticking the box to the far left of the relevant transaction.
The options ‘restore’ and ‘delete’ will then appear, allowing you to remove duplicated transactions but also, if you make a mistake, restore a deleted line. If you have already reconciled both the original and duplicated transaction, then you will need to remove it from this screen but you will have to remove the transaction from the ‘account transactions’ page as well.