Many of our clients like to use Excel for their bank reconciliations. Others use highly bespoke automations capable of performing the entire bank-to-book process. (If you haven’t seen our recent RPA presentation, check it out here.) 

Many other clients want to consolidate their business in one space so transactions are easily pulled, historic and current reports are available in just a few clicks, and work completed is easily trackable and reviewed. 

Enter MRI Software’s Bank Reconciliation program!

The Benefits of MRI Bank Reconciliations

Data at Your Fingertips

One of the key benefits of using MRI Software’s built-in bank reconciliation module is that the transactions you have already entered into MRI to Accounts Payable, Commercial Management, Residential Management, Accounts Receivable, or the General Ledger are already in one convenient location. 

With just a few basic pieces of information, a user can open and load all the transactions for a bank account and jump right into reconciling them against the statement. This can be a major time-saver. 

Spotting Issues Before They Become Too Big

MRI makes it easy to identify if there is any discrepancy between what is reconciled in MRI and what is showing as cleared at the bank. While some view these discrepancies as an obstacle to completing the month-end close process, they are actually a great way to ensure the continued integrity of your data. 

If a cash receipt was entered into the wrong bank and possibly into the wrong cash account, for example, the bank reconciliation process will highlight that mistake so it can be corrected quickly. If there was a glitch during the processing of cash transactions in MRI, however, it may be overlooked during normal reporting processes for some time. These rare errors are brought to light during an MRI bank reconciliation so that, when reconciliations are performed monthly, issues can be addressed in a timely manner.

Another feature of the New Bank Reconciliation system (as of MRI version X.5.9) is that a bank reconciliation can be required to balance before a user can commit it. This is an Accounts Payable option that is turned off by default. Users attempting to commit an out-of-balance bank reconciliation will be warned about the discrepancy, but they can still close the bank reconciliation when this option is disabled. With this function enabled, they will be warned and unable to finalize the bank reconciliation until the difference is resolved to zero. This is yet another way to maintain data integrity from period to period.

Easy Use and Navigation

Within the web-only New Bank Reconciliation module in MRI, users have more control than ever before over what data loads to a page. Setting filters, such as transaction status, source (e.g., AP versus CM), and type (i.e., withdrawal or deposit), allows users to easily sort through transactions to reconcile them against the bank statement. 

Transactions can even be filtered by a specific date, period, or amount to help match and reconcile statement data as efficiently as possible.

Reporting in Just Two Clicks

The New Bank Reconciliation program offers reports built into the bank reconciliation page, and using them could not be simpler. Just click on the “I want to …” menu and select the appropriate report. MRI will fill in the details, meaning the user only needs to select the runtime options and run the report. The usually time-consuming and laborious process of reporting is a snap with MRI bank reconciliations. 

Reopen a Bank Rec in One Click

Before MRI version X.5.5, reopening a bank reconciliation required someone on your staff to know SQL and run queries or, failing that, to call MRI support. (Of course, REdirect Assist clients would simply open a ticket with us.) Now, though, a user can be given the appropriate level of security access to reopen bank reconciliations in one click. 

This functionality eliminates the need to open a support case, gives you security-based control over which users can access the tool, and eliminates the risk inherent in manually running queries. 

Please note: This function is available only if you are using the New Bank Reconciliation program.

Unlock a Bank Rec in One Click

Another common problem many of our clients encountered when using MRI (before version X.5.9.7) was that a bank reconciliation could be accidentally locked by a user who closed the page instead of clicking on the “Exit” button to leave the bank rec. 

This could cause major problems if the user could not be tracked down to exit the bank reconciliation correctly (or, in some cases, if the user was no longer with the company). Since the bank reconciliation would be locked under their user ID, a query would have to be run to unlock it. 

In version X.5.9.7, however, MRI has created a new Additional Access security function. This can allow a user to unlock a bank reconciliation from the bank rec selection screen.

Are There Any Downsides to MRI Bank Reconciliations? 

Unfortunately, few things in this world are perfect, including technology. The New Bank Reconciliation program from MRI does have some known issues. Fortunately, most are either entirely preventable, situation-specific (and therefore rare), or cause no greater issue than some minor inconvenience.

If you are using or considering using MRI’s bank reconciliation module and would like more information regarding these known issues, please feel free to reach out to us for more information. We will be happy to lend our support and connect you to some relevant resources. 

Get Assistance With MRI Bank Reconciliations 

Overall, MRI bank reconciliation is an excellent feature that works well and should be considered a valuable tool in your month-end close process. 

If you are using MRI Software and have not already chosen to switch to the New Bank Reconciliation program, we would be more than happy to help you get started. If you are not using MRI for bank reconciliations, we are ideally positioned to help you implement MRI bank reconciliations as part of your MRI monthly processing for the first time. And if you are still looking at the first paragraph of this article and wondering what this RPA thing is all about, we would love to tell you all about it.

No matter how we can be of assistance, you can reach us via our contact page.