The Banking page is where your real bank activity meets your books. Lines arrive, you (or your rules) say what each one is, and only then do they become bookkeeping.
Two ways in, one river
- A connection brings activity in when you pull. TaDa Books reads your bank through SimpleFIN, a connection service you sign up for (and pay for) yourself: connect your banks there, create an app connection, and paste its setup token into TaDa Books once, from the Pull button beside the upload. The first pull lets you match each bank account to an account in these books. To change that matching later, open Bank connections in your name menu and press Map accounts beside the company; it opens the company's Connections screen (in the menu, the Bank and card feeds row), where the Which bank account feeds which account table says, row by row, which account at the bank feeds which account here (each column has a question mark explaining it). Connection used is normally Same as the company; pick Always a named connection only for an account that needs a different service than the rest. A connection belongs to the person who set it up: only they see the accounts at the service that these books do not pull (a personal account, another company's), and only they can link more. After that, Pull brings in what is new. On Connections, the Schedule line says when it pulls; press Change and turn on Pull automatically once a day, and the first opening of the books each day pulls for you. Banks publish new activity roughly daily.
- A statement upload covers everything else. Download a statement (PDF or CSV) from your bank's website and drop it in. The reader works out the bank's format by itself, shows you what it found, and tells you if a page looks off, before anything is saved.
Both paths land in the same place, and TaDa Books removes duplicates, so a statement overlapping a feed does not double anything.
Spreadsheet files from anywhere. When you upload a CSV or Excel file you tell TaDa Books which column is which, once per account. It also works out how the file writes its dates and amounts. A date like 25/04/2026 can only be day first; when every date could be read either way (05/04 could be May 4 or April 5), TaDa Books picks the reading that keeps the statement within a few weeks, and if that does not settle it, it asks you and shows both readings beside each row. Every preview row says what its date means, so a file cannot come in a month off. Amounts written 1.234,56 and files that use semicolons read too. Your choices are remembered for that account.
A bank download in a different currency from the account is refused, so euros never land in a dollar account as dollars. Upload it to the account that holds that currency.
Skipped as already imported. After an upload, TaDa Books lists every line it skipped because the same line is already in the account: the same date, amount and description, or the bank's own transaction id on the same date and amount. If one of them really is a second, separate transaction, press Import anyway on its row: it comes into Review with that upload, and no rule adds it on its own. When a bank reuses its id for a different day or amount, the line comes in flagged Possible duplicate for you to decide.
What counts as a possible duplicate. The same amount on the same day, or within two days with a shared name. Words every bank uses (online, transfer, payment, transaction) do not count as a shared name. Account and reference numbers decide first: two transfers from different accounts, or with different transaction numbers, are never flagged; a line the bank re-worded or re-masked (the same number, now shown as XXXX3005) still is.
The four tabs
- Review is the inbox: lines waiting for your answer.
- In the books holds every line whose money reached the books, of two kinds. Categorized lines are the ones you added, and Add created the entry. Matched lines are the ones TaDa Books paired with something that already existed (an invoice payment, a bill payment, a transfer between your own accounts); confirming a match creates nothing new, it just marks the existing entry as cleared by the bank. The selector beside the tabs shows one kind or both. A matched line names what it is matched to (for example "Matched to Journal Entry of 2026-10-02 (-$40,000.00)"); an amber Amounts differ chip means the entry was changed after the match and the two no longer agree - press Undo and match it again. Changing an entry's amount so its bank line no longer fits sends the line back to Review on its own, and the save says so.
- Excluded are lines you have set aside on purpose (a duplicate, a personal charge) with a note of why. They never reach the books.
When there is nothing left to do in a tab, Banking shows the account's Register instead of an empty table: after you handle the last line in Review, and when you switch to an account that has nothing in the tab you were on. Pressing a tab yourself always opens it, empty or not.
Someone else can be working the same books at the same time - your bookkeeper on another computer. Pressing any of these tabs, or coming back to the browser tab or window, reads the list and the account cards again, so a line they already handled leaves your Review and the card's "to review" count follows.
Categorizing
For each line, pick the category (and class and payee if you use them) and add it. When TaDa Books recognizes the line it proposes the answer for you, with a reason you can see. Anything that repeats deserves a rule: "anything containing CITY WATER goes to Utilities, payee City Water Co." Rules run on every future pull, and a rule can post automatically once you trust it. An automatic rule only acts on lines that just arrived, never on a line you already picked for or undid, and deleting a rule clears the suggestions it left behind.
A memo typed on a line is saved on the line as you type, so it is still there after a reload or on another computer, and the entry the line becomes carries it - whether you add that one line or press Accept all. Leave the memo empty and the bank's own text becomes the entry's memo.
Columns you do not use. The eye in the Class, Job, Payee and Memo headings hides that column; it then waits as a small chip beside Actions, and a click on the chip brings it back. Whatever was picked in a hidden column stays on the line and is still used when you add it. The choice is remembered for you on any computer.
Accept all opens Post the ones you are sure of: every line that has a category - from your rule, from you, from a bill you expect every period, or from the history fill you ran - across all your bank and card accounts, each row saying why it is there. Untick any you want to look at first (an amber No class marks a line that would post without one), narrow to one account with its chip, and press Post. Held back for you and counted at the top: split or memorized lines, lines flagged Possible duplicate, and lines that look already in the books (match those instead).
The press is one batch. Undo this batch puts every line it posted back in For Review and voids the entries they became, right after posting or later: the window shows your last batch with its own Undo. A line that has since been reconciled, or whose month is locked, stays posted and says why; clear that and press Undo again.
Undo sends a line back to Review and voids what it created. It is refused for a date inside your locked period, and for an entry an invoice or bill payment sits on (unapply the payment first; the message names it). Removing an uploaded file brings back any line a bank pull had hidden as its copy, so no month goes missing.
Voiding an entry, a received payment or a bill payment that a bank line was recorded as sends that line back to Review too, so the money never sits "in the books" against a voided entry. An older line that still does wears an amber Its entry was voided chip; press Undo to bring it back.
Editing an entry so its money lands in a different bank account (say you recorded a deposit in checking that really went to savings) sends the original account's bank line back to Review. The editor tells you before you save, and the line is then yours to match or add again.
Bought stock by card, or sold it over the counter? Add the bank line as usual (for stock bought, pick the item's inventory account as the category), then open the added line's view, choose Edit, pick the Item and Qty on the line, and Save.
Money coming in that pays a customer's invoice (a tenant's Zelle for the rent you invoiced) should not be added as income: the invoice already counted it. Press Match on the line. Under the list, Is a customer paying an invoice? picks the customer (the one named on the bank line is chosen for you), fills their open invoices oldest first up to the amount, and Receive on invoice records the payment, dated the bank date and deposited straight to this account, and matches the line to it. The amounts applied must add up to the bank line exactly. Click an invoice's number to open it and check what it billed before you pay it. After Receive on invoice the screen says what was recorded; Undo on that line (under In the books) deletes the payment again, as if it was never recorded, and its invoices owe that money again. To split one payment across several invoices, type how much goes to each in its Pays box; to pay part of one invoice, type the part. When the bank text names a customer who owes you, the line in For Review says so with a green Customer paying? tag; its Receive on invoice opens that same window. A transfer whose text names nobody (a bank's own transfer service) gets the tag too once the same sender has paid one customer's invoices before, marked "this sender paid them before", and that customer is picked for you in the window.
If you press Add on money coming in with an income category while a customer who owes you is behind it (you picked them on the line, the bank text names them, the same sender paid them before, or the amount equals one of their open invoices), TaDa Books asks first: Is this a payment on an invoice? It shows what they owe and on which invoices. Receive on invoice opens the Match window to record it as the invoice's payment; Add as income anyway adds it as you chose. Tick Don't ask me again to stop the question for your login.
Already added one as income by mistake? Open the invoice and press Find payment: it lists that customer's money not yet tied to an invoice, including a deposit booked straight to income, and Apply moves it onto the invoice so the income counts once. The bank line stays matched.
When Find a match splits one bank deposit between two customers (or one check between two vendors), the bank line stays tied to both halves, so the money cannot be matched a second time.
When a line looks like money moving between two of your own accounts, it wears a violet Transfer tag naming the other account, and Record as transfer fills it in. TaDa Books reads the line for which account it means: a line that names an account by its last digits ("Online Transfer from CHK ...6331") is only ever offered as that account. When the digits belong to none of this company's accounts, the money came from outside these books (another company of yours, or a personal account), so there is no Transfer tag; pick the category yourself, or use Between companies. A line whose category one of your rules filled in, or that you picked yourself, shows no Transfer tag either: that category is already your answer.
A rule can also fill a memorized transaction - a deposit that splits across two accounts, a paycheck with its taxes. Those lines show a Review button instead of Add, because the amounts can change from month to month. Review opens the rows already filled and names the rule that filled them; check the amounts and press Save and add to record it. Save the split keeps the rows on the line without posting, for later.
Fill in from your history
Rules answer the lines you wrote rules for. For everything else, the violet sparkles button on the For review toolbar reads how you categorized the same merchants before - both from bank lines you have already added and from entries you typed by hand - and fills in the account, the class and the payee where your own past decisions agree. It only ever touches lines with no category yet. A rule's proposal is left as it is. On a line where you picked only a class or a payee, it fills just the category and keeps your pick, and the chip's hover says which part is yours. Nothing is posted until you press Add.
It also knows your regular payments when the bank's wording names nobody. A bank's own bill pay ("BILL PAYMENT ...") or a new way of paying the same bill still fills in when the same amount, to the cent, has left the same bank account on its usual day and gone to the same category at least three times in a row - including months you booked as one journal entry paying several bills. One earlier month is enough when both the bank's wording and the amount match. And when one company bills you two different amounts (monthly dues and a quarterly fee, say), each follows its own past, not the other's.
Rows it filled turn violet and carry a chip. Hover the chip and it tells you exactly what it matched - the merchant, how many times you have seen it, the span of dates, and whether the amount is one you always pay. Click the chip and a window lists the actual past entries it learned from, so you can judge the evidence yourself. If your books class their money and your history could not settle the class (the same vendor paid for different properties, say), the chip turns amber and says Needs a class - the row is deliberately not finished until you pick one.
Change your mind in one click: the undo arrow beside the sparkles takes back everything the fill wrote, and only that - your own picks stay, including a class you had picked on a line it then filled. Once you have read the rows, Accept all posts them along with everything else.
Merchants TaDa Books already knows
Your own history cannot help on a merchant you have never categorized, and in your first week that is every merchant. So where the history has nothing to say, TaDa Books falls back on a shared list of the merchants any small business meets - the fuel brands, the card processors, the phone companies, the office suppliers - and where businesses in general book them.
Those rows turn indigo rather than violet, and the chip says plainly that the answer came from a general list and not from anything you taught. The list never picks a class or a payee, because it cannot know yours. Your own history always wins: the shared list only ever answers where the fill stayed silent, Accept all posts it like any other filled row, and the same undo arrow takes it back.
It says nothing at all when it does not recognise the merchant, or when your chart names the account something it does not recognise. A missing suggestion costs you one pick; a wrong one costs you finding it later.
You choose what it reads. Clicking the sparkles opens a window before anything happens. It says how many lines have nothing assigned yet - the only rows the fill may touch - and offers three choices:
- My books, then general - the default, and what is described above.
- My books only - the shared list is never consulted. Use it when you would rather have a gap than a general answer.
- General list only - your own past decisions are ignored on that run. Useful when the history in your books came from somewhere else and you do not trust it yet.
Pick one and press Fill in - the button names the number of lines it will look at, and it stays off when every line already carries something. The choice is remembered for you, not for the computer you are sitting at, so it follows you from the office to home.
Employee cards on one account
A business credit card often carries extra cards for staff, and the bank reports each card's spending under its own number - so mapping just the main card quietly misses everything the staff spent. On Connections, every mapped account offers + Employee cards: tick the staff cards that belong to the same card account and their transactions join that one account's feed. One card in TaDa Books, exactly like the bank's combined statement - nothing new appears on the Banking page.
On a bank account the same control reads + Sub-accounts and speaks of sub-accounts instead - the mechanics are identical.
Every merged line wears a small chip naming where it arrived, so "who spent this" is answered at a glance in For review. Cards sharing a balance are grouped together, and one matching the main card carries a Same balance hint - banks usually report the account's balance on every one of its cards - but nothing is ever attached for you: you tick, you save. The columns sort, and your sort follows you to any machine.
Prefer to track an employee card as its own account in TaDa Books? Do not attach it - map it on its own row instead, exactly as before. A card attached to one account is never offered anywhere else, the same one-place rule every mapping follows.
Rules your books are asking for
Beside the Rules button sits a violet lightbulb. It reads the last twelve months of your own decisions and proposes the rules those decisions are asking for - a merchant you have categorized the same way three, seven, fifteen times is a rule you have already written by hand, over and over.
Each proposal says what a rule would look for, where it would put the money, how sure it is, and how many past lines it would have caught. Open the arrow on the right and it lists the actual transactions behind it, because nobody should accept a rule they cannot check. Where the dates form a pattern, it says so: "Every quarter, around the 20th".
It never proposes something you already have. Every pattern is replayed against your live rules first, and the ones already covered are counted in the green chip rather than offered again. A short list with a big green number is the compliment it looks like.
A proposal whose class your history could not settle is held back in amber until you pick one, for the same reason the fill does it: on books that class their money, a rule that fills only the account makes a line look finished when it is not. Pick the class in the row and the proposal is ready.
Tick what you want, press Create, and the rules are yours - they behave exactly like ones you typed, they suggest rather than post, and they take effect the next time you press Apply rules.
If a month looks wrong
Nothing that came from the bank is ever lost. A line can be un-excluded, a category can be changed later (the report drill is often the fastest way to spot and fix one), and the reconcile is the monthly proof that your books and the bank agree.
The Undeposited Funds card
When money is sitting in Undeposited Funds - payments received but not yet taken to the bank - Banking shows a card for the drawer: the balance, how many payments are waiting, and the oldest one's date. Record deposit right on the card groups them into the one deposit line your statement will show. When the drawer is empty the card steps aside; the account itself always remains visible on the Chart of Accounts and the Balance Sheet.
A brokerage and its positions
A brokerage account is one box on Banking: its total value at cost on top, then its Cash register and each position you hold. Click Cash for the register the statements upload and reconcile into. Click a position (shares of a fund, say) for that position's own register: every purchase adds what it cost, every sale takes away the cost of the shares sold, and the balance is what the position stands at on the Balance Sheet. The filter picks Sales or Purchases. Buys and sales are entered from the Cash register, which pays for them and receives the proceeds, so the position's register offers no New transaction; click an entry to see or change its journal. Click any bank or card to go back.
A receipt or invoice attached to an entry is compared with it, and a difference is shown under the attachment. Paper dated before the payment, up to 60 days, is reported quietly: an invoice is dated when it is issued and paid later, so its date stays as it is. A payment dated before its paper, or far from it, is shown as worth a look.
A receipt that matches a bank line
When a receipt in Documents looks like a charge waiting in Review, the charge's row says so: a Receipt? chip names the receipt, states the evidence in plain words (same amount, one day apart, the name matches), and lets you open the receipt to check. Use it links the receipt to that bank line; Not it puts the suggestion away for this visit.
A linked receipt shows as Receipt linked on the row, and the link is kept with the line itself: it is still there after a reload, on another computer, and for anyone else who works these books. A bank line is not yet an entry, so the receipt attaches to the entry the moment the line becomes one, however that happens: Add, a split Add, a rule posting it, Match to an existing entry. From then on the receipt sits on the entry the way any attachment does, and no other bank line is offered it. Unlink puts the receipt back among the suggestions.
Suggestions come from receipts that carry an amount and a date. A photo the reader could not date is not suggested; give it a date in Documents and it joins the next time the list refreshes.