GUIDE
How to catch up on months of bookkeeping
Six months behind. A year behind. Maybe longer. You know the work needs doing, but every time you open the folder — or the shoebox — you close it again because you do not know where to start. Every month looks equally urgent, so nothing gets done.
The way out is not a weekend of grim determination. It is a system that breaks the problem into pieces small enough to actually finish. Here is how to build one.
01 / START WITH WHAT YOU HAVE
Bank statements, not receipts
Most people who are behind do not have neatly filed receipts. What they do have is a bank account or credit card that recorded every transaction as it happened. Your bank statement is the single most reliable source of truth for what you spent, when, and with whom.
Export CSV statements from every account and card you use for your business. Most banks and card providers let you download a statement as CSV in one click — look for "Download as CSV" or "Export transactions" in your online banking portal. If you have multiple accounts, export each one separately.
Do not worry if the column headers look different from one bank to another. The tool that makes your plan will figure out which column is the date, which is the description, and which is the amount.
02 / ONE MONTH AT A TIME
Oldest first, newest last
There is a reason accountants ask for the oldest records first: earlier months are simpler. Fewer transactions, less complexity, and if there are errors, they are easier to spot when the pile is small. By the time you reach the most recent months, you will be faster and more confident.
A good catch-up plan does this automatically. It reads your bank CSV, splits every row by calendar month, and sorts the months oldest first. For each month you get:
- How many transactions — a simple count so you know the size of the task.
- Money in and money out — the totals for the month at a glance.
- Flagged receipts — transactions above a threshold you choose, so you know which ones need a receipt pulled.
- Recurring bills — descriptions that appear every month (subscriptions, regular bills) that you can categorise once and move on.
- Unusual transactions — amounts that do not fit your normal pattern, worth a closer look.
03 / SET A RHYTHM YOU CAN KEEP
Thirty minutes is enough
The people who catch up are not the ones who block out a whole weekend. They are the ones who do one month at a time in whatever rhythm their life allows — a lunch break, an evening, half an hour between meetings.
A good catch-up plan estimates how many sessions each month will need at the pace you set. If you choose 30-minute sessions and a month has 120 transactions, the plan tells you to expect roughly two sessions for that month. You do not have to decide how much time to set aside — the plan does the math.
Tip. You do not need to finish a whole month in one sitting. The checklist for each month names exactly what to tackle: which receipts to find, which descriptions to categorise once, which transactions look unusual. Stop when you finish the checklist item, not when you run out of steam.
04 / WHAT TO DO WITH EACH MONTH
A simple review workflow
- Scan the flagged receipts. For each transaction above your threshold, find the receipt or invoice. If you have it, file it. If you do not, make a note of the transaction — date, amount, payee, what it was for — while you still remember. Your bank statement is evidence of the payment even without the paper receipt.
- Categorise the recurring bills. Subscriptions, software licences, insurance premiums, regular supplier invoices — if the same description appears every month, tag it once. You will not need to look at it again until something changes.
- Review the unusual items. One-off large transactions, refunds, transfers between accounts — these often need a decision: is this business or personal? Does it belong in this month or should it be reallocated?
- Note anything that needs professional advice. If a transaction raises a question — is this deductible? Is this capital or expense? — write the question down and take it to your accountant. Do not try to resolve it yourself during the catch-up pass.
05 / WHEN TO BRING IN AN ACCOUNTANT
Know what you are handing over
If you work with an accountant, the best thing you can bring them is not a shoebox of receipts. It is an organised list of what happened in each month — transactions reviewed, receipts filed, questions noted. That is worth more to them (and costs you less in fees) than raw records they have to sort through themselves.
Catchupbooks does not replace your accountant. It replaces the paralysis of not knowing where to start. The output is a structured checklist you can work through yourself and then hand to a professional with clear questions.
06 / THE TOOL THAT MAKES THE PLAN
Turn your CSV into a checklist in one minute
Catchupbooks is a free browser tool that reads your bank CSV and produces the month-by-month plan described above. There is no sign-up, no account, and no data upload — everything runs in your browser. Drop in your statement, set a receipt threshold and your preferred session pace, and the plan is ready to download or print.