Bank feeds and categorizing

Connecting

In Banking, choose Connect a bank and sign in to your bank through Plaid. RiverBooks never sees your bank password. For a bank Plaid can’t reach, add the account by hand and import its CSV export.

The review list

New transactions land in Review. Each one may carry a suggestion: a matching invoice payment or Stripe payout, a transfer between your own accounts, a rule, or a category suggested by AI. Confirm it, choose a different category, split it across several, or exclude it (for example a duplicate). Pending transactions show but can’t be booked until they post.

Rules

When you categorize something, RiverBooks remembers it for the same merchant. You can also create rules yourself (for example “descriptions containing ADOBE go to Software and Subscriptions”), and River can suggest rules for you to approve.

Personal spending and owner money

Money you take out for yourself goes to Owner’s Draws; money you put in is Owner’s Contributions. Neither is income or an expense.

Reconciling

Once a month, compare RiverBooks with your statement in Banking → Reconcile: enter the ending balance and tick off what cleared.