How to review a bank statement PDF before importing expenses

Check the file before checking the totals

Use a statement downloaded directly from your bank and keep the original. Try selecting the transaction text in your PDF viewer. If the page is only a scanned image, a text parser may find no entries at all. Do not interpret an empty preview as proof there was no spending.

WealthOS reads text from supported PDFs locally in the browser. Its current limits are 10 MB and 20 pages. It does not provide OCR or universal compatibility with US, UK or European bank layouts. You can enter records manually when a layout is not supported.

Resolve dates and signs

A date such as 03/04 can mean March 4 or 3 April. Establish the statement’s convention before reviewing the preview, and check its year. Currency symbols and separators can be ambiguous too; a decimal comma and a thousands separator are not interchangeable.

Confirm whether debit means money leaving the account and how the bank marks refunds. A credit-card statement may present charges differently from a current-account statement. Never approve an import solely because the descriptions look familiar.

Prevent duplicate expenses

Overlapping statement periods and transactions already entered manually are common sources of duplicate records. Compare the account, date, amount and description. Two identical amounts on the same day are a reason to investigate, not automatic proof of a duplicate.

Check internal transfers and credit-card payments separately from purchases. Do not record the card payment as a second purchase if the underlying purchases are already in your spending history.

Reconcile and save only the reviewed entries

In WealthOS, choose the destination account, inspect each proposed row, adjust descriptions and categories and confirm only the entries you recognize. Ambiguous lines can be ignored by the parser, so an apparently clean preview may still be incomplete.

Compare imported income and expenses with the original statement. Where available, check the opening balance plus inflows minus outflows against the closing balance, using the same period and posted transactions. Investigate differences before relying on the result. Never upload a statement to a public feedback form.

1. Verify text, period, date convention and currency.
2. Review debit and credit signs and the destination account.
3. Resolve existing entries, transfers and card payments.
4. Compare totals with the original and save the reviewed rows.