why wont this dumb thing balance!?!

Please tell me I am not the only one to be completely lost on occasion balancing a check book. I'm better off than I was this morning, but I still cant get the darn thing to balance! Ahhh! This is usually my husband's job for a reason!!!

I use MS Money to keep my finances in line. If I didn't I'd never balance my checkbook.Good luck to you.

Actually I am using Money...and I still cant get it. My bank did something so I havn't been able to update in a few weeks untill today. I guess it was somewhere in there I got lost!

My wife does all the money management in our house. I started to post "I let my wife do all the money management . . ." isn't that a puffed-up chauvinistic thing to say ? I am trying to be better about such, but old habits die hard. As for the money, I told Betty (my wife) that if I got my allowance every month, she could do as she pleased with all the rest and I wouldn't question her at all. She is a wonder with finances, used to have a pretty high position with the old VNB in Norfolk. She still has a high position -- the pedestal I keep her on.

Leonard.

i could never keep my checkbook balanced, so i quit trying, i actually bounced a couple of checks that way cuz i screwed it up... i still use checks and a checkcard, i just check my balance daily on-line and keep track in my head... it has worked out great for the past two years...no problems so far!

Originally Posted by winwin

My wife does all the money management in our house. I started to post "I let my wife do all the money management . . ." isn't that a puffed-up chauvinistic thing to say ? I am trying to be better about such, but old habits die hard. As for the money, I told Betty (my wife) that if I got my allowance every month, she could do as she pleased with all the rest and I wouldn't question her at all. She is a wonder with finances, used to have a pretty high position with the old VNB in Norfolk. She still has a high position -- the pedestal I keep her on.

Leonard.

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My husband will be out of the military in a few months and he is going to college to study finance. Lucky me huh?

Originally Posted by winwin

My wife does all the money management in our house. I started to post "I let my wife do all the money management . . ." isn't that a puffed-up chauvinistic thing to say ? I am trying to be better about such, but old habits die hard. As for the money, I told Betty (my wife) that if I got my allowance every month, she could do as she pleased with all the rest and I wouldn't question her at all. She is a wonder with finances, used to have a pretty high position with the old VNB in Norfolk. She still has a high position -- the pedestal I keep her on.

Leonard.

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This made me smile. Just today our new financial advisor talked to hubby about moving an IRA out of an expensive fund "a no-brainer". Hubby who is well trained said he would think about it (meaning he would talk to me about it). The advisor just said - have the wife call me and we will decide on it. Poor hubby was embarrassed cause he had to admit who really made the financial decisions.

Originally Posted by winwin

My wife does all the money management in our house. I started to post "I let my wife do all the money management . . ." isn't that a puffed-up chauvinistic thing to say ? I am trying to be better about such, but old habits die hard. As for the money, I told Betty (my wife) that if I got my allowance every month, she could do as she pleased with all the rest and I wouldn't question her at all. She is a wonder with finances, used to have a pretty high position with the old VNB in Norfolk. She still has a high position -- the pedestal I keep her on.

Leonard.

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That's not always safe. For almost thirty years, my mother handled all of my parents' finances. After Mom's stroke, Pops sat down with the books and HE almost had a stroke! Mom is (was) a compulsive shopper and had numerous maxed-out credit cards (one had a balance of around $25,000). She was moving money around between various cards and making only minimum payments. Thank goodness, she can't dial QVC anymore.

ugh i dont even want to THINK about balancing out money as thats about what i do all day at work.. lol *runs away screaming*

Yeah I have the problem too...why? cause steve never turns his receipts in for his check card.and i magicaly find them out after checking our online banking...

I somehow got to be a few cents off here and there and it didn't bother me!!!! But now I am like a dollar or two off because of why??? Dunno... I think it's just best to get someone else to look at it, may be a mathmatical error... Someday maybe I'll have the same number as the bank!

i'm off right now as well. i usually check our balance online a couple of times a week, but when the computer crashed a couple of weeks ago, it was a little while before we had everything back up and running. i have been off a couple of times before, but usually i have a pretty easy time figuring out why. this time i think i'm going to have to have my husband take a look, maybe a fresh set of eyes will see what i'm missing?

I'm still with the old-fashioned "manual" method. I am not comfortable doing finances on the computer, i.e., on-line banking and such. When I write a cheque I write it in my little book and when I update my balance at the ATM I go through and check off what has gone through and what hasn't.

My husband and I each keep separate chequing accounts. He pays certain bills and I pay certain bills and have specific amounts automatically withdrawn for RRSP's and CSB's and anything left over for either of us is for us to manage as we see fit. I don't touch his chequing account and he doesn't touch mine although all our accounts are joint accounts.

We never purchase any major items without discussing it with each other and agreeing about how much, and where we will take the money from to pay for it.

It's worked very well for 28 years so if it ain't broken I ain't gonna fix it!

Originally Posted by Yosemite

We never purchase any major items without discussing it with each other and agreeing about how much, and where we will take the money from to pay for it.

It's worked very well for 28 years so if it ain't broken I ain't gonna fix it!

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We do this also. It was something my Youth Pastor growing up did with his wife and we decided to do it also before we got married. It deffiantley helps!

I'm so glad I'm not alone in my check book dilemas!

Now why did you have to go and mention balancing checking accounts? That's a reminder that I haven't done it in three months, and I'm going to have to get at it. I hate that job!

What my late husband and I always used to do was to keep an extra $1000 in each checking account at all times. We just considered $1000 to be like zero and we couldn't spend any more than that unless it was a true emergency. That helped save the day when we made mistakes in our math and the account really went under that figure. But, of course, we still had the battle of balancing the accounts, usually monthly, if not, eventually.

I use Quicken and call the automated line 2-3 times a week and balance it then. It wasn't such a pain before we started using a checkcard as I'd always used duplicate checks and so always had a copy. But now it is imperative that I get all the receipts. I'm actually worse about "handing the receipts in" than he is although I'm getting better, just had to get in the habit of putting them all in the same place.

I'm happy to say that these days it always balances which it didn't before I started using this program. I'm horrible at math, and somehow even with the calculator I'd always be anywhere from a few cents to a few dollars off.

I handle the finances in our family too, mostly because I was simply more experienced at it when we got married (I was just shy of 30 and he was a bit over 23) although I do make him do the bills every now and then so in the event something should happen to me he'll know where things are and what's going on.

Cindy

I let DH balance the check book as he is a CPA. The checkbook he physically carries with him so if I want to write a check for some reason I have to take one. Otherwise I usually use the debitcard and because the checkbook is in his briefcase I never write them in and then get yelled at!!!

I don't balance a checkbook. I keep track of it in my head. I've never bounced a check since I've had my own bank account with no one else on it. When I was married he kept track of everything. One time he told me there was enough in there to buy $50 worth of groceries. I wrote a check. It bounced. I didn't know it bounced until it got turned over to a collection agency. It's still on my credit report

Personal checks were abolished in the EU when the euro was introduced, so no more balancing check books! Payments are made by credit transfer, direct debit, debit card, credit card, or good old-fashioned cash. I'm the only one who uses the debit and/or credit cards, and I don't have any trouble keeping up with what amount I've spent. We both check the monthly bank statements.

I use iBank on my Mac, and it's cheap but slightly buggy. At one point I was trying to balance it and I came up with a HIDEOUS negative number on my bank account and a HUGE positive number on my Credit Card. I cracked myself up thinking about my new banking system...