Clean up a year of transactions

Say you freelance as a designer. Client work runs through a Studio ledger, home money through a Household ledger, and after a year plenty of transactions still have no category. Your AI can find them, make rules for the vendors that keep coming back, fix the one-offs in one pass, and leave you with reports you can read. Not sure which approach fits a merchant? Read rules or a one-time cleanup? first.

How to do it

1. See what's left. Ask your AI which merchants are still uncategorized over the last 12 months, with a count and a total for each. Name the ledger, Studio or Household. See ask about any transaction.
2. Clean up raw names first. A charge that reads SQ *CORNER BAKERY 4471 is easier to sort once it has a clean name, and rules match the name as it is stored now. See clean up a merchant name.
3. Make rules for repeat vendors. For a merchant that always belongs in one category, such as your internet bill, ask your AI to make a rule and name the category. Create a rule has the details.
4. Test, then apply. Ask how many transactions the rule matches, then ask your AI to apply it. See test, edit, turn off or delete a rule. If two rules could match the same merchant, see when two rules match the same merchant.
5. Fix the rest in one pass. For one-offs, or a category that depends on the amount or the date, ask for a one-time change and check the preview before you confirm. See recategorize many transactions at once.
6. Pair up money moving between your accounts. A card payment from checking or a move to savings with no category counts as spending until it is linked or categorized as a transfer. See link the two sides of a transfer. You can also ask your AI to find duplicate transactions. Name the period, since the check covers the last 60 days unless you do.
7. Check the year. Ask for spending by category for the 12 months. Anything still uncategorized shows as one Uncategorized group. See your year in spending.

What you'll see

For the first prompt, your AI finds the 12 monthly FiberNet Home bills with no category and saves the rule. It reports that the rule matches 12 transactions, then applies it, and the 12 bills move to Internet. It may show a preview and ask before saving.

For the second, your AI lists the uncategorized merchants that repeat, such as 48 Daily Grind Coffee charges and 12 FiberNet Home bills, and suggests a rule for each. Nothing changes.

For the third, your AI saves the rule in Studio and categorizes the four Paper and Pixel Supply charges there as Supplies. Household gets no rule.

The rule also sorts FiberNet Home charges that come in later. Imported transactions and ones your AI adds without a category get it as they're saved. New bank transactions get it the next time you open the web app or ask your AI something. If a charge was missed, see a rule didn't categorize a transaction.

Good to know

• Rules sort new transactions, not old ones. A rule categorizes matching transactions that come in after it's saved. Transactions already there change only when your AI applies the rule, as it creates it or when you ask it to apply your rules to transactions you already have.
• A one-time fix is final as far as rules go. The categories it sets count as yours, so rules never change those transactions afterwards, even a rule you make later.
• One pass changes at most 500 transactions. The preview doesn't say when more matched. For a full year, ask your AI to work through it by date range.
• A rule matches the merchant name only. Capital letters don't matter. It can't look at amounts, dates or accounts.
• Each ledger keeps its own rules. A vendor you pay from both Studio and Household needs a rule in each. See run several businesses in one account.
• Name the ledger. Searches and reports cover the ledger your AI is working in unless you name another.