"Bank Balance" leads to omission of pending transactions from Cash Flow (edited)
PROBLEM: Any time you are viewing transactions using "Bank Balance", all of your cash flow projections disregard any pending transactions. However, the whole point of selecting "Bank Balance" is that the reported balance does not include pending transactions — and so, it would seem appropriate to credit/debit any pending transactions from the reported bank balance at the beginning of the Cash Flow.
EXAMPLE: Your bank balance is $5000. You have a pending debit of $4000. Under "Balance with Pending" your balance would show as $1000 at the beginning of your cash flow plot. However, under "Bank Balance", the $4000 pending debit disappears entirely — it is now reflected neither in the balance, nor in the cash flow projections — and so the end result is that your projections are all falsely inflated by $4000 from here forevermore.
This is a major problem and can lead to huge cash flow errors. This applies both to Recurring/Reminder transactions, pending transactions, and also A2A transfers.
Recommend fixing this ASAP!!!
Comments
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However, the whole point of selecting "Bank Balance" is that the reported balance does not include pending transactions
If by "reported balance" you mean the balance the bank is reporting to Simplifi, then I think you may have the meaning of the options reversed. (Let me know if I misunderstood your post. It happens.)
The purpose of the "Balance Type" option is to allow you to correct the reported balance depending on whether your bank includes pending transactions in that balance.
- If the bank does not include pending transactions, use "Balance with Pending."
- If the bank does include pending transactions, use "Bank Balance (Default)."
Note: I posted what I hope is a clear explanation of how the Balance Types work here and one of the coaches confirmed that it is the correct understanding.
DryHeat
-Quicken Classic (1990-2020), CountAbout (2021-2024), Simplifi (2025-…)0 -
Sorry ... my verbiage may have been confusing, because there's what the bank is actually reporting, and what you select for each account in Simplifi, and what you select to be displayed.
To make this more clear, here are the steps to reproduce:
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Hello @bob303727,
Thanks for the reply. I fear that it may have been incomplete, however. Can you let us know what you were trying to convey?
-Coach Jon
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[[ @Coach Jon apologies for prior incomplete comment, unable to edit/delete in two browsers ]]
Sorry ... my verbiage may have been confusing, because there's (A) what the bank is actually reporting, (B) what you select for each account in Simplifi, and (C) what you select to be displayed in the global setting.
Furthermore, there are two types of pending transactions: (1) those reflected in Simplifi that are not yet reflected in the bank [e.g., manually entered Pending transactions, recurring transactions, and Simplifi-initiated A2A transfers]; and, (2) those reflected in the bank's records someway/somehow that are not yet settled. Simplifi should handle both types appropriately.
With that background, the exact problem I am reporting is:
PROBLEM: User-created Pending entries in Simplifi -- either manually-created Pending transactions (that have not yet sync'd up with a statement line from the bank), or Simplifi-initiated A2A transfers -- are only reflected in Cash Flow when the Balance Type is set to "Balance with Pending", regardless of what the bank is actually reporting.
STEPS TO REPRODUCE:
- On Transactions page of a bank account, select "Balance Type" of "Bank Balance"
- a. Create an A2A transfer of $5000 to another account
– or –
b. Create a manual Pending transaction of $5000
EXPECTED OUTCOME: Under displayed balance type of "Bank Balance," the displayed account balance should stay unchanged, but the $5000 pending A2A or expense should appear as a "dot" in the Cash Flow that causes the projected balance to drop by $5000.
ACTUAL OUTCOME: Under displayed balance type of "Bank Balance," the $5000 pending A2A or expense is never reflected anywhere in Cash Flow. You have to change the balance type to "Balance with Pending" in order to "see" it -- in which case, the Pending transaction is manually added/subtracted BY SIMPLIFI to the balance it received from the bank.
See these two screenshots. Regardless of what balance type the bank is reporting, one of these Cash Flows ought not to exist.
0 - On Transactions page of a bank account, select "Balance Type" of "Bank Balance"
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EXPECTED OUTCOME: Under displayed balance type of "Bank Balance," the displayed account balance should stay unchanged, but the $5000 pending A2A or expense should appear as a "dot" in the Cash Flow that causes the projected balance to drop by $5000.
Projected Cash Flow will not show past transactions, even pending ones, no matter what Balance Type you select. It starts with your current balance and then shows the effect of future transaction reminders only.
The Projected Cash Flow graph will only give the correct projection if the starting balance for the Cash Flow — which is the balance shown in Simplifi — accounts for all pending transactions. If your bank balance counts the pending transactions, that's good. Otherwise, you have to change the Balance Type to "Balance with Pending" so that Simplifi will do the work of applying those pending transactions to your bank balance.
But I think there's another problem that may not be solvable. If your bank does count pending transactions, it will only count the ones it knows about. It will not count manual pending transactions you have entered. If you have both types, I'm not sure there is any setting that will give you the right result.
DryHeat
-Quicken Classic (1990-2020), CountAbout (2021-2024), Simplifi (2025-…)0
