There are two ways you can import transactions into Business Finance Assistant, either from a downloaded bank statement or from a manually created CSV file. Please see the instructions below for further information on both.
Section 1: Download a statement from your bank
Section 2: Import bank statement
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DOWNLOAD A STATEMENT FROM YOUR BANK
Go to your bank's website and login using your online credentials. Most banks will have a statement section as highlighted in the image below. For other banks, if you’re not clear how to download your statement, please contact your provider.
Bank statements are usually provided in different file formats. The best way to import a bank statement into Business Finance Assistant is to use Quicken (QIF) or Open Financial Exchange (OFX) format as highlighted in the image below. Other file formats like Comma-Separated Values (CSV) are accepted but require specific formatting. More information on this can be found in the FAQ section of this document.
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CHOOSE THE RELEVANT DATE RANGE YOU NEED TO IMPORT
In order to avoid duplicate transactions, you need to check the date range you want to import. A good way to do this is to look at the date of the most recent transaction in your Business Finance Assistant account and only use transactions after that date.
Once you've selected your dates and downloaded your statement, it should appear in your Downloads folder on your computer, ready to import.
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IMPORT A BANK STATEMENT
Within the 'Bank Transactions' section of the Business Finance Assistant, select the account you wish to import the statements to and press the 'Actions' button, then 'Import Bank Statement'. You will see a screen like the one below.
From here click 'Choose file' and select the bank statement you just downloaded. Once the file is selected, an 'Import' button appears. Click the 'Import' button.
It will show a preview of what is about to be imported.
If you need to omit certain transactions, open the 'Advanced' section and change the start or end dates:
Click 'Done' at the bottom of the screen to import the transactions.
Please note, if Business Finance Assistant doesn't recognise the format or content of the file you are importing, please just copy the data from your bank statement into the template provided in the next part of this article below.
IMPORTING A MANUALLY CREATED CSV (EXCEL) FILE
HOW DO I MAKE A CSV FILE BUSINESS FINANCE ASSISTANT CAN UNDERSTAND?
Attached to this article is an example template for importing a statement into Business Finance Assistant (template-import-bankstatement.csv). Using a program like Microsoft Excel, Apple Numbers, Google Sheets, or OpenOffice Calc, build a spreadsheet that matches the template attached below.
Any data that doesn't fit this import template cannot be imported into Business Finance Assistant.
Please make sure when populating your file that:
- your date format matches dd/mm/yyyy (e.g. 12/03/2020)
- all amounts must be formatted as a number
After building your spreadsheet, ensure you save it as a CSV format as shown below.
HOW DO I IMPORT A FILE INTO BUSINESS FINANCE ASSISTANT?
Once your file is ready, use 'Import Bank Statements' (as detailed in Section 3) to import your CSV file into Business Finance Assistant.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
WHAT IF MY BANK DOESN'T PROVIDE QIF OR OFX FILES?
If your bank doesn't provide QIF or OFX files, you will need to use CSV format for importing bank statements. Statements downloaded in a CSV format will need to be edited so that Business Finance Assistant can successfully import all the information.