Choice: you can manage your online banking records with one of:
- a spreadsheet program like Excel, Quattro Pro, or Lotus 1-2-3
- or an integrated money-management program
Spread sheet banking is streamlined for efficiency
Use a spreadsheet to maintain check registers for, say, checking and savings accounts and some credit-card accounts. With Xchequer, one click of the mouse does most banking activities. These operations are easier for users than comparable operations with money-management software. The spread sheet gives you added flexibility to do the unusual operations that money-management programs do not have built in. Some of the built-in Xchequer operations are:
- Click on an icon to phone the bank. Download recent transactions.
- Click on another icon, and Xchequer merges the new transactions with your spreadsheet.
- Enter outstanding-check amounts in a labeled cell, to reconcile to your checkbook.
- Click on a menu to reconcile the spreadsheet to end of month or to an arbitrary point.
- Click on a menu to sort and subtotal in various ways.
- Click on a menu to label transactions with a category name.
Once you type in a category name on a transaction, Xchequer will, at a menu click, label all transactions for that payee with the same label, in red, so you can review and modify the labels.- Click on a menu to close out the year and start a new spreadsheet for the next year.
Use a money-management program if you want to coordinate your bank accounts with financial planning, or with managing business records or investment accounts like brokerage accounts. As the complexity of tasks required grows, a specialized money-management program that does those tasks well is likely to be the best tool to use.
Copyright © 1996 Janice M. Stone. All rights reserved.
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