WaveApps automatic account loading has bugs! Clark Wilkins, Simplexable 2019.05.05

I like Wave Accounting a lot — enough that I use in now in replacement for a platform I wrote and maintained for 22 years. That said, it's got some wrinkles, and this is a bad one. The automatic download of checking account/credit card data can (and does) fall over on a regular basis — screwing up the balances.

What appears to be happening is the data intake is doubling up the transactions where cash is flowing from the cash bank account to pay a credit card that is also linked and auto-uploading. This is easy to see in the register, but you might have to take the decision which of the two you want to delete. The answer is it does not matter. The amount is correct, but it's in the system twice.

What I did to verify this was to use the reconciliation (which is a lovely experience I need to comment on separately). In Wave, you reconcile a month by simply entering the statement date and ending balance. Now follow along here, because the next part is important.

If you have Wave auto-loading the account, it should be pulling in every transaction from your bank — not on the date you may have written the check or swiped the card — but on the date the account actually posted.1 When you go to reconcile, you enter the statement balance and ending date, and Wave falls over.

The amounts do not agree because Wave has double-entered one (or more) credit card payments. Now what you do to fix it is this:

  1. Open your Wave data with the “View” button.
  2. In the new window that opens, pay attention to the CREDIT column.2
  3. If you spot the duplicated payment, click on one (blue link) and delete it.
  4. Close the transactions tab, and then close the reconciliation details tab. You should be back at the reconciler window.
  5. Press the small edit button to the right of the words “Statement Balance” on the line where the amounts don't agree.
  6. Don't change anything. Just press “Save” to recheck. If there was only one problem in the month, the account should not be reconciled, and you are all done.

It's possible there are other issues, but highly unlikely unless you are uploading Receipts this account or doing some sort of manual entries. As a rule, you should not do either of these ever on an automatic loading account.

OK. I am not pretending to be Wave Support here, but this is a nasty bug that affected people I know, so I want the solution to be out there.

NOTES

  1. Think of it this way. You write me a check on July 1. I cash it on July 10. Since you are diligent, you write in your register July 1. The bank, however, does not care what you write. They clear the check on July 10, so that's what comes up on the statement.
  2. Yes, it's counter-intuitive, but in double-entry accounting a “debit” increases a cash account balance, and a “credit” decreases it. Here, we (or at least I) know we're looking for a doubled payment out of the account — hence, we only need look at credits.