Stupid silly question - Dates
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John Kent
Jan 24, 2023, 10:06:00 AM1/24/23
to bean...@googlegroups.com
For the first time I’m having someone help me review my accounts for my LLC and it’s raised a few questions I’ve never worried about. Especially around dates for transactions that post at different times because of ACH transfer times between to banks the date is different for each leg.
Somehow I managed to do it for the first time such that the legs crossed the calendar year (deducted from the first bank of 12/29/2022 posted at the receiving bank of 1/3/2023. This was driving the person crazy because they were reconciling and the dollars were off. But also transactions were accounted for.
How do y’all typically handle transactions that have different dates for each leg? I’ve temporarily split the transaction into two and placed the opposing legs in an account under equity.
Somehow I managed to do it for the first time such that the legs crossed the calendar year (deducted from the first bank of 12/29/2022 posted at the receiving bank of 1/3/2023. This was driving the person crazy because they were reconciling and the dollars were off. But also transactions were accounted for.
How do y’all typically handle transactions that have different dates for each leg? I’ve temporarily split the transaction into two and placed the opposing legs in an account under equity.
Red S
Jan 24, 2023, 6:09:11 PM1/24/23
to Beancount
For the mechanics of similar situations, I use:
For the account to book to, it can vary. I usually put it inside Assets or Liabilities so it doesn't "get lost" under equities. YMMV.
John Kent
Jan 25, 2023, 1:26:35 PM1/25/23
to Beancount
Thank you! I'll look into both of these suggestions as they look to be able to address both of the obvious situations I was thinking about.
Martin Blais
Jan 25, 2023, 9:22:17 PM1/25/23
to bean...@googlegroups.com
If you want to be pedantic create a transfer account and make it two transactions, one to the transfer account, and one from it.
Beancount doesn't support doing this automatically, but it's a small project one day that it will (mainly for credit card to bank transactions).
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Red S
Jan 25, 2023, 10:17:00 PM1/25/23
to Beancount
That's exactly what the effective_date plugin I pointed to above does automatically, BTW. Zerosum is related: it doesn't split it for you, but matches pairs of transactions in the transfer account and moves them out to help you figure out the unmatched ones easily.
fin
Jan 26, 2023, 12:38:40 AM1/26/23
to bean...@googlegroups.com
Martin Blais wrote:
...
i wanted both transactions in each file because they let
me book things in the CC account ledger to specific
Expenses. i call the account in between a Pass-Through
account so the value should stay somewhere around zero
but not always.
in good news that means i've mostly got my trans-
actions for the banks imported. just a few small
files left that won't take too long. the longer
term project will be to get all the older files
converted and that will take some time, some of
them are typed in already i just have to change
their format into beancount entries and what i'm
learning for my current project will make that
much easier.
petl has a tab separated import and that will be
easy for me to use as i can convert my files from |
separated fields to tab separated fields in a few
moments...
the brokerage account is a csv format and nothing i've
tried has worked easily enough so today i looked at petl
and i like how it is a direct and self-contained light-
weight set of things to use so i'm learning that and
already got it to load up my transactions to a table.
now i have to do the rest of the conversions and
processing on those but it won't be too difficult as
there are decent enough examples in the documentation
and in the example files themselves.
one thing i ran into that was strange to me and took
some time to figure out was that when printing a table
on the terminal it was only showing me a part of the
table and not the whole thing and i thought that meant
the rows were not being imported into the table, but
after a while i found out how to count rows per file
and to print the whole thing out, number of fields per
line and such, etc. so it was working fine the whole
time. that's what learning is all about though. :)
i don't mind this kind of hacking and learning in the
winter months. :)
fin
...
> If you want to be pedantic create a transfer account and make it two
> transactions, one to the transfer account, and one from it.
> Beancount doesn't support doing this automatically, but it's a small
> project one day that it will (mainly for credit card to bank transactions).
that's pretty much what i ended up doing after realizing
> transactions, one to the transfer account, and one from it.
> Beancount doesn't support doing this automatically, but it's a small
> project one day that it will (mainly for credit card to bank transactions).
i wanted both transactions in each file because they let
me book things in the CC account ledger to specific
Expenses. i call the account in between a Pass-Through
account so the value should stay somewhere around zero
but not always.
in good news that means i've mostly got my trans-
actions for the banks imported. just a few small
files left that won't take too long. the longer
term project will be to get all the older files
converted and that will take some time, some of
them are typed in already i just have to change
their format into beancount entries and what i'm
learning for my current project will make that
much easier.
petl has a tab separated import and that will be
easy for me to use as i can convert my files from |
separated fields to tab separated fields in a few
moments...
the brokerage account is a csv format and nothing i've
tried has worked easily enough so today i looked at petl
and i like how it is a direct and self-contained light-
weight set of things to use so i'm learning that and
already got it to load up my transactions to a table.
now i have to do the rest of the conversions and
processing on those but it won't be too difficult as
there are decent enough examples in the documentation
and in the example files themselves.
one thing i ran into that was strange to me and took
some time to figure out was that when printing a table
on the terminal it was only showing me a part of the
table and not the whole thing and i thought that meant
the rows were not being imported into the table, but
after a while i found out how to count rows per file
and to print the whole thing out, number of fields per
line and such, etc. so it was working fine the whole
time. that's what learning is all about though. :)
i don't mind this kind of hacking and learning in the
winter months. :)
fin
Red S
Jan 26, 2023, 2:05:02 AM1/26/23
to Beancount
On Wednesday, January 25, 2023 at 9:38:40 PM UTC-8 fin wrote:
petl has a tab separated import and that will be
easy for me to use as i can convert my files from |
separated fields to tab separated fields in a few
moments...
the brokerage account is a csv format and nothing i've
tried has worked easily enough so today i looked at petl
and i like how it is a direct and self-contained light-
weight set of things to use so i'm learning that and
already got it to load up my transactions to a table.
fin
Jan 26, 2023, 9:51:23 AM1/26/23
to bean...@googlegroups.com
Red S wrote:
...
those do help explain something i'd seen before and not
understood about the importer i was trying to adjust to
work for my TDAmeritrade csv files. i was copying the
schwab csv investement importer and then modifying it to
work, but didn't get it to work. i may try it again now
- the description field has to be parsed to determine
the transaction type.
and even if i can't get that to work completely if it
does most of the transactions i can fix up a few by hand
afterwards but it ultimately won't matter since TDAmeritrade
is merging with Schwab.
i'm enjoying learning and poking at things when i get
time. :)
fin
...
> If it helps:
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/reading-and-manipulating-tables-in-csvs-via-petl/
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/making-sense-of-multitable-csvs/
thanks! :)
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/reading-and-manipulating-tables-in-csvs-via-petl/
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/making-sense-of-multitable-csvs/
those do help explain something i'd seen before and not
understood about the importer i was trying to adjust to
work for my TDAmeritrade csv files. i was copying the
schwab csv investement importer and then modifying it to
work, but didn't get it to work. i may try it again now
- the description field has to be parsed to determine
the transaction type.
and even if i can't get that to work completely if it
does most of the transactions i can fix up a few by hand
afterwards but it ultimately won't matter since TDAmeritrade
is merging with Schwab.
i'm enjoying learning and poking at things when i get
time. :)
fin
Red S
Jan 26, 2023, 6:52:42 PM1/26/23
to Beancount
On Thursday, January 26, 2023 at 6:51:23 AM UTC-8 fin wrote:
Red S wrote:
...
> If it helps:
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/reading-and-manipulating-tables-in-csvs-via-petl/
> https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/making-sense-of-multitable-csvs/
thanks! :)
those do help explain something i'd seen before and not
understood about the importer i was trying to adjust to
work for my TDAmeritrade csv files. i was copying the
schwab csv investement importer and then modifying it to
work, but didn't get it to work. i may try it again now
- the description field has to be parsed to determine
the transaction type.
Correct.
does most of the transactions i can fix up a few by hand
afterwards but it ultimately won't matter since TDAmeritrade
is merging with Schwab.
With TDAmeritrade in particular, it's still awesome currently because they 1) provide ofx files (unlike Schwab), 2) provide it via a direct download interface (scriptable, no browser needed).
However, I can't recall how far back their ofx history goes. Many institutions limit their ofx history, and are more generous with csv history. I don't know how far back you need data either. If the dates you need are available, I highly recommend using their ofx because it's far better than csv. The ofx importer is already in beancount-reds-importers.
fin
Jan 26, 2023, 11:59:54 PM1/26/23
to bean...@googlegroups.com
Red S wrote:
> thanks! :)
>
> those do help explain something i'd seen before and not
> understood about the importer i was trying to adjust to
> work for my TDAmeritrade csv files. i was copying the
> schwab csv investement importer and then modifying it to
> work, but didn't get it to work. i may try it again now
> - the description field has to be parsed to determine
> the transaction type.
>
> Correct.
made good progress today. :)
> thanks! :)
>
> those do help explain something i'd seen before and not
> understood about the importer i was trying to adjust to
> work for my TDAmeritrade csv files. i was copying the
> schwab csv investement importer and then modifying it to
> work, but didn't get it to work. i may try it again now
> - the description field has to be parsed to determine
> the transaction type.
>
> Correct.
at least i finally got it to start processing a file so
i can work along and plug in the different transaction
types as i get through them.
...
> With TDAmeritrade in particular, it's still awesome currently because they
> 1) provide ofx files (unlike Schwab), 2) provide it via a direct download
><https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/direct-downloads/>
> 1) provide ofx files (unlike Schwab), 2) provide it via a direct download
> interface (scriptable, no browser needed).
>
> However, I can't recall how far back their ofx history goes. Many
> institutions limit their ofx history, and are more generous with csv
> history. I don't know how far back you need data either. If the dates you
> need are available, I highly recommend using their ofx because it's far
> better than csv
><https://reds-rants.netlify.app/personal-finance/a-word-about-input-formats-use-ofx-when-you-can/>.
>
> However, I can't recall how far back their ofx history goes. Many
> institutions limit their ofx history, and are more generous with csv
> history. I don't know how far back you need data either. If the dates you
> need are available, I highly recommend using their ofx because it's far
> better than csv
> The ofx importer is already in beancount-reds-importers.
right, but they don't have those files for export just
csv files for a normal account holder. perhaps the ofx
files are available via their other platforms which i
don't use? i don't directly download anything yet. i'm
trying to get my history imported.
the csv files i've been able to get go back to 2005 for
my oldest account, but it has been converted twice (when
Waterhouse merged with Toronto Dominion and then again
when TD merged with Ameritrade) and i don't know if they'll
do it again or how far back but if they do i'll be
interested to see what they do
fin
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