How to reconcile a bank statement (and what "footing" means)

"Reconcile" gets used for two different jobs, and mixing them up is how errors slip through:

1. Proving a statement's transactions are complete: that the list of transactions you have (typed, copied, or converted from a PDF) adds up to what the bank says. This is the check you do before importing anything.
2. Bank reconciliation: proving your own records (your books or checkbook) agree with the bank, after accounting for timing differences.

Both rely on the same idea: totals that must agree.

What does "footing" mean?

In accounting, to foot a column is to add it up; the total sits at the "foot" of the column. Investopedia describes footings as the totals at the end of each column, used to arrive at an account's balance (Investopedia). Cross-footing checks that a set of column totals adds up to the grand total; AccountingTools calls it "an essential tool of the auditor" (AccountingTools). Auditors even mark footed columns with a tick mark in their working papers (AccountingTools).

A bank statement "foots" when:

opening balance + total money in − total money out = closing balance

The product name Footed comes from this check.

Part 1: Prove a statement's transactions are complete

Use this whenever you have transactions that didn't come straight from the bank's own export: retyped, copy-pasted, or converted from a PDF.

Worked example

A one-page statement says: opening balance 3,250.40, closing balance 4,936.65. Your spreadsheet has these rows:

Check 1, the foot. Money in = 2,150.00 + 27.50 + 1.12 = 2,178.62. Money out = 92.37 + 400.00 = 492.37. 3,250.40 + 2,178.62 − 492.37 = 4,936.65. It matches the closing balance, so the statement foots.

Check 2, row by row. Each row's printed balance should equal the previous balance plus money in minus money out: - 3,250.40 + 2,150.00 = 5,400.40 ✓ - 5,400.40 − 92.37 = 5,308.03 ✓ - …and so on to 4,936.65 ✓

Now suppose the conversion had read the refund as money out. Check 1 gives 3,250.40 + 2,151.12 − 519.87 = 4,881.65, off by 55.00, exactly twice the refund. Check 2 pinpoints it: the 06/06 row is the first where the balance stops agreeing.

Rule of thumb: a difference equal to twice a transaction usually means a sign error; a difference equal to a transaction usually means it's missing or duplicated; a difference divisible by 9 often means transposed digits.

In Excel

With the opening balance in E1 and transactions from row 2 (C = money out, D = money in, E = printed balance):

Whole statement:  = E1 + SUM(D2:D500) - SUM(C2:C500)        → must equal the closing balance
Row check (F2):   = ROUND(E1 + D2 - C2 - E2, 2)              → fill down; every cell must be 0

Use ROUND, or floating-point leftovers like 0.0000000001 will look like errors.

Why "it foots" is necessary but not sufficient

AccountingTools makes the point plainly: a report "can crossfoot perfectly while still containing omitted items, duplicated entries, incorrect account coding, or unsupported amounts" (AccountingTools). Two errors can cancel out. The row-by-row check is much stronger because a compensating error has to happen on the same row to hide. Where a statement prints only a daily balance (common on some US statements) rather than one per transaction, check at each day's end instead.

Part 2: Bank reconciliation (your books vs the bank)

Once the statement is complete and in your system, reconcile it against your own records. Banks publish worksheets for this, and they all follow the same shape (Wells Fargo worksheet, Bank of America guide):

1. Start with the statement's ending balance.
2. Add deposits you've recorded that aren't on the statement yet (deposits in transit).
3. Subtract checks and payments you've recorded that haven't cleared (outstanding items).
4. The result is your adjusted bank balance.
5. On the book side, add credits and subtract charges the bank recorded that you haven't (interest, fees, automatic payments).
6. The two adjusted figures must match. If they don't, look for transactions in one record and not the other, amounts keyed wrong, or entries in the wrong period.

Capital One's walkthrough adds a practical step: tick off each transaction that appears in both records, then deal with what's left (Capital One).

In QuickBooks or Xero, the software runs this for you once the statement lines are in; you enter the statement's ending balance and work the difference to zero. That only works if the imported lines are complete, which is Part 1.

How Footed does Part 1 for you

When you convert a PDF with Footed:

• It checks opening balance + extracted transactions = closing balance.
• Where the statement prints a balance on each row, it checks every row against it.
• Rows that don't agree are highlighted, so you can compare them with the PDF before downloading.

The PDF is opened in your browser; only the extracted text is sent for parsing, processed in memory and not stored.

FAQ

What does it mean to reconcile a bank statement? Proving that two sets of numbers agree: either the statement's transactions against its own opening and closing balances, or your records against the bank's.

How often should a business reconcile? At least monthly, when each statement arrives. Errors are cheaper to find while the month is fresh.

What if the statement has no running balance column? Check 1 still works. Some statements print a daily ending balance table instead; check at each day's end.

Can a statement balance and still be wrong? Yes, if two errors cancel. That's why the row-by-row check matters.

See the check run on your own statement. Footed converts PDF statements to Excel, CSV or OFX and highlights any row that doesn't reconcile. Free for 5 pages a day.

Published 2026-10-07.