Troubleshooting Cash Totals: Verifying Opening Balances
Opening Balances are critical to ensuring accurate cash metrics and reporting. In Digits, an Opening Balance represents the amount in a client’s bank account when Digits begins tracking data. It serves as the starting point for calculating metrics like Total Cash on the Dashboard and drives downstream reporting accuracy.
How Digits Sources the Opening Balance
When you connect a bank account for a client, Digits attempts to retrieve the Opening Balance through one of the following methods:
From QuickBooks Online (QBO): If the client’s data is imported from QBO, the Opening Balance is brought in automatically. You’ll see this logged as "imported from QuickBooks" in the Activity Log.
From the Bank (via Plaid): For direct bank connections, Digits retrieves up to 2 years of transactions using Plaid. If the account is recent enough, it uses this data to calculate the balance as of the connection date.
If No Data Is Available (Older Accounts or Manual Setup): If Digits cannot retrieve the balance—typically because the account predates the Plaid window—it estimates the Opening Balance based on the first visible transaction and books it as a journal entry labeled "Digits generated opening balance."
When You Might Need to Adjust (or Remove) the Opening Balance
You may need to update the Opening Balance if:
The client’s Total Cash appears incorrect
Older transactions are missing
The opening balance doesn’t match the bank statement as of the connection date
You want to replace the generated balance with a more accurate one
How to Find the Opening Balance Entry
Because the Opening Balance represents the start of history, it’s often far back in the Ledger.
To locate it:
Go to Accounting → Ledger → All Transactions
Use the date filter to jump to the earliest available date
Look for a Journal Entry labeled:
Digits generated opening balance, or
Imported from QuickBooks
Tip: If scrolling is slow, narrowing the date range to the first month of activity usually surfaces the entry quickly.
Updating or Removing an Opening Balance
Opening Balances in Digits are recorded as manual journal entries, so you have full control over them. Unlike transactions pulled in through a bank connection, opening balance entries can be edited or deleted.
If an Opening Balance doesn’t look right, it’s usually best to delete it and recreate it with the correct amount, rather than trying to offset it later with additional entries.
Option A: Edit the Existing Opening Balance
Go to Accounting → Ledger → All Transactions.
Locate the Opening Balance entry (Journal Entry or Pay In).
Toggle to Edit mode at the top of the screen.
Adjust the amount.
Click Save & Close.
Option B: Delete and Recreate the Opening Balance
Step 1: Delete the Existing Entry
Open the Opening Balance journal entry.
Toggle to Edit mode at the top of the screen.
Click the Trash icon in the top right to delete.
Step 2: Create a New Opening Balance
Go to Ledger → All Transactions
Click New Transaction → Journal Entry
Enter the correct opening balance amount
Assign the appropriate accounts
Click Save & Close
Unsure of the correct amount? Refer to the client’s bank statement from the date of connection. Need journal entry help? See: Journal Entries in Digits.
Backfilling Historical Data (Optional)
If you have a CSV of older transactions, you can backfill to improve accuracy:
Go to Ledger → All Transactions.
Click the dropdown next to New Transaction → Import Bank Transactions.
Upload your CSV file and confirm the field mappings.
Click Next to complete the import.
✨ Digits will incorporate this data and improve the overall accuracy of metrics and history.
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