From time to time you may want to tidy up a client's raw transactions—perhaps to consolidate similar categories or fix incorrectly categorised transactions. There's a step-by-step outline below, or feel free to watch the demo video.
We also have a great webinar that takes you through the process in detail.
Before you begin, some tips inside CashDeck
Choose which accounts to include
You may decide to leave some accounts from a Living Expense analysis. For example, you may like to exclude joint or business accounts.
Read how to choose which accounts to include.
Link multiple applicants in one expense analysis
Many loan applications have more than one applicant and you may wish to combine multiple clients in one expense analysis. Learn how to generate a single expense analysis spreadsheet that includes data for multiple applicants
Navigating your Excel file
Your client's information will appear in individual worksheets, including Summary, Accounts, Expense and Income Summaries, Income vs Outgoings as well as a complete transactions list.
About the Analysis
To make sure you fully understand the scope of the analysis, please read the Summary and Notice sheets. They outlines the potential limitations in the accuracy of the dataset provided.
The app categorises all available transaction data and presents it as tables and charts by month.
In some cases our systems are unable to identify the merchant or the description, so they may appear as uncategorised. For a more accurate analysis, you may want to discuss these transactions with your client and update the category on the All Transactions worksheet.
Any changes made to categories will need to be updated in the tables and charts. This is done in the Excel file by manually selecting the Data Ribbon and the clicking Refresh.
Editing a client's transactions
The Expense Summary page shows your client's expenses by category. You may want to edit these to combine categories or change incorrect categories.
Merging categories
If you have 2 similar categories that can be combined—like Entertainment and Subscription TV for example, you can combine them.
Head to the All transactions tab and click on the Category column heading.
In this example, scroll down and select Entertainment and Subscription TV from the drop down list. Press OK. That will show all the transactions with those categories.
Select and copy the word Entertainment, select all the items in the Category column and paste over them. They will now all be categorised as Entertainment.
Click on the Data tab in the top menu and hit Refresh All.
Bank on the Expense Summary page you'll see the Subscription TV transactions have been combined with Entertainment.
Changing a category
If a transaction has been incorrectly categorised you can easily fix it.
Under the All transactions tab, click on the Category column heading.
Scroll down and select the incorrect category from the drop down list. Press OK. That will show all the transactions with those categories.
Select the items in the Category column and type over the incorrect category with the correct one.
Click on the Data tab in the top menu and hit Refresh All.
Bank on the Expense Summary page you'll see the change.
Checking Internal transfers
We collect transactions where client have move money around internally. Although they are not officially expenses, we include them so you can check over them before perhaps choosing to hide them.
Find Internal transfers on the All transactions page and look at the transaction details.
If you're satisfied that your client is simply moving money around between their accounts, head back to the Expense Summary page and click on the Category heading.
Press the filter icon and deselect the Internal transfers box. They will be removed from the Summary and the totals updated.
If you have any questions please get in touch through the Support bubble inside your CashDeck application.