Add banking rules

Add banking rules to tell QuickBooks what to do with unaccepted (downloaded or uploaded) bank transactions that meet particular conditions.

To add a rule:

1. In the navigation bar, click Transactions > Banking (or Banking > Bank Feeds depending on what you see).
2. Click the Update drop-down arrow and select Manage rules.
3. Click New rule.
4. Enter a descriptive name and select whether the rule is for a money-in or money-out transaction.

Rule names can have only letters, numbers, and spaces.

1. Select the bank account the rule applies to.
2. Set up the conditions QuickBooks should look for when downloading bank items. Keep in mind that rules aren’t case sensitive. You don’t have to create multiple rules to accommodate upper-case and lower-case variations in the Description and Bank text conditions.
  Select Field Select operator Enter condition
  Description
  Contains
  Is exactly
  Doesn’t contain
  Text
  Bank text
  Contains
  Doesn’t contain
  Text
  Amount
  Equals
  Is greater than
  Is less than
  Doesn’t equal
  Numbers only
3. (Optional) To add additional conditions for the same rule, click Add line and enter the conditions.
  1. To require that all the conditions must be met before the rule is applied, select all above the list of conditions.
  2. To require that any condition can be met for the rule to be applied, select any.
4. Set the action QuickBooks should take when the conditions are met. You can assign:
  - Payee
  - Category
  - Tax code (if applicable)
  - Class
  - Location
  - Memo

Select Field	Select operator	Enter condition
Description	Contains Is exactly Doesn’t contain	Text
Bank text	Contains Doesn’t contain	Text
Amount	Equals Is greater than Is less than Doesn’t equal	Numbers only

You may not see all the fields listed above. To make sure your rules work, QuickBooks only shows you the fields you can use with your version of QuickBooks and the way your company is set up. For example, class is only available if you’re using QuickBooks Plus and you’re tracking classes.

1. (Optional) Click Split if you want the rule to divide a bank transaction between different categories, tax codes, or classes. You can assign splits by percentage or amount. To add more line items as needed, click Add line.
2. (Optional) Select Automatically add to my books if you want QuickBooks to automatically accept transactions that meet these conditions and move them to the In QuickBooks tab.
3. Click Save. The rule is added to the bottom of the list of rules, which is the lowest priority.

QuickBooks applies only one rule per transaction. For example, if the first rule applies to a transaction, then no following rules will be applied

(Optional) To move a rule up or down in priority, drag its handle up or down.

What happens to the transactions?

If you didn’t select “Automatically add to my books,” QuickBooks applies the rule to unaccepted transactions and displays “RULE” in any rows that meet the conditions you specified. You just need to add them to your books.

If you did select “Automatically add to my books,” you don’t need to manually add the transactions because QuickBooks automatically moved them to your books. They appear in the In QuickBooks tab with an Auto-add icon next to “RULE.”