AccountingBLOCK - Accounting Forums

I'm so lost, I'm reconciling the bank account dated back to Jan 2007. Unfortunately, the accounts were not kept up, that's where I come in. I have to input all bank transaction and amex charge dated back to Jan 2007. My question is, where do I put or move all the other charges dated from 2006 to 2003. They are showing up in the reconcilition page, all of the deposit, checks and payment. We do not have any documents for 2003 thru 2006. He is not concern with those, therefore, we are basically starting from 2007. 2007 is the fresh start.

Do I do general journal entries, if so, how? What do I do??? Help???

I would first go through the 2007 bank statements looking for checks & deposits from 2006. Then I would do one large bank rec for 12/31/06 and clear everything from 2003-2006 except for those that cleared in 2007. Use the opening balance on the Jan 2007 bank statement as your ending 12/31/06 balance. You may need to do an adjustment to get the bank statement to reconcile properly. Since this relates to prior years create an account called Prior period adjustment under "Other expense" and post the adjustment there. (The CPA will probably move that adjustment to Retained Earnings at tax time.) This will keep 2007 clean of adjustments and allow you to continue to enter all of the 2007 transactions.

__________________
Zahid H. Lilani

"It's always best to start at the beginning." - - Glinda, the Good Witch of the North

First order of business is figuring out what information is available for 12/31/06. Were there financials? Was there a tax return? Are there any fixed assets? Is there any information available?

Fact is that, if there was an accountant in the mix, they should be able to provide you with a starting point. If not, then you should basically start with a new file as of 1/1/07 and start entering transactions. Prior year transactions will sort themselves out in the bank recs. Eventually, someone will have to come up with possible balance sheet information, if any. But if you just focus on 2007 transactions, that prior year information can wait, although that can be unnerving.

Charly