How Often Do You Check Your Bank Balance Online?

Here's a comment recently left on my post titled Money Saving Tip: Balance Your Check Book:

Here's another idea. Check your online banking account and balance WEEKLY.. if not every few days... It's an easy habit and you catch things sooner and can plan better.

I check my bank balance online every other week on average as I'm usually transferring money here or there for some reason, but if I wasn't doing that, I don't know if I would be checking my bank account online regularly.

Couple questions for you:

1. Do you think checking your bank account online is a good practice or something that's not needed?

2. How often do you check your bank balance online?

Comments

[PT]

1. I think it's a great practice. It's actually the only way I'll know my balance since I don't get paper statements. I have to go online. It helps me pick up on bogus bank charges immediately, and ensure transactions come in according to my receipts.

2. I check everyday. Overkill? Maybe.

[AmandaD]

Great idea to check it, at least weekly. I check it almost everyday, depending on how busy I am that morning and if I'm expecting/waiting/anticipating transactions to clear.

[Sully]

I check it bi-weekly when I get paid. I update my checkbook with checks that have cleared, deposits/withdrawals that have been made and make sure it all reconciles. More than that is definitely micro-managing your finances.

[Michael]

I try to check my bank accounts and credit card accounts on a daily basis to make sure the balances agree to my Excel spreadsheet (still kind of old school).

[Skott]

I check it every day. It takes me what, 30 seconds?

[MelMoitzen]

Before going to electronic billpaying for my checkwriting, I used to check it daily. Also while transferring money in and out related to my recent home purchase in an effort to ensure my funds were clearing as quickly as they should. But normally I check it perhaps weekly.

A large part of cutting back from daily checking is because I'm an intense Quicken user. The online register of transactions on my bank's website never varies by more than a day from what I have in my Quicken register. The rare surprises I find when I log in online are the occasional checks that have cleared which I forgot to record in Quicken.

While I don't check my bank account very often online, one thing I check daily is my credit card transaction activity. Three times in the last year I've found fraudulent activity on my accounts, and have been able to report it the same day it appeared online, in time for credits to show up by the time the statement is issued (and hopefully assist the card issuer's security folks to get a beat on the bad guys).

[Jazmin]

I check it probably two or three times a week. More often when I've got a lot of activity going on, or when a balance is about to hit a magic round number (Up or down. :) I think it's a valuable tool in keeping track of what's there, and how things are moving, although like jumping on the scale too often when you're dieting.. checking every few minutes is obsessive and not a lot of help.

[Benjamin]

I check nightly via Microsoft Money by clicking a button. It shows what transactions have cleared for the prior day and my current balance. This allows me to track any potentially fraudulent activity. I also do this with my credit card and investment accounts. I use Microsoft Money/Quicken connectivity as a criteria for opening a new accounts.

I also have my accounts set up to email me any large transactions that occur on my accounts and my email account set to send me an SMS notification.

Ben

[Jo]

It depends, on average it's atleast twice a month. But usually it's more, and for times like right now where I am waiting for a transaction to happen or see if a check has been cashed yet, I check it sometimes it several times a day. I'm trying to get in the habit of doing it atleast weekly. My sister-in-law checks their accounts almost daily and she is always right ontop of their finances. She's my financial role-model!!

[dianefromPA]

I check almost everyday. We have income coming in irregularly and I want to know just how much is in the account in case I need to transfer money in (or money out.)

[Geoff]

I check all my online accounts everyday. Takes me about 2 minutes. How?

Yodlee.

[Kurt]

Just have your bank automatically email you your balance (or text it to you). Then it takes 2 seconds. 2 minutes is way too long.

[Kurt]

Oh, and have the bank do it everyday automatically. That way you instantly know when something is screwed up.

[Rob Lewis]

Yep, I think it's a good idea to check it regularly, I do it about twice a week.

[Zook]

I check my Bank of America 'My Portfolio' at LEAST 5-times a week, making sure checks have cleared, making sure bills and deposits are all set for their really awesome budget software to take over.

The other cool think is keeping tabs on outside accounts with credit cards and brokerage companies under ONE location. The BOA access they provide is really amazing. I can view expenses YEARS back, follow how much I have spent on items etc. etc.

I NEVER let frequent views of my money at brokerage accounts skew my long-term view. I think it can be detrimental to check and constantly buy-sell stocks, but since I don't fall into that category, I don't see a problem. If anything watching all the profits fall off, I am MORE motivated to send money using 'Bill Pay' into these brokerage accounts to buy these stocks and funds at a discount.

In this day in age, with people not knowing where there money goes and how much fees are costing them and not keeping a budget, I honestly think if you checked your accounts 5-times a day, that isn't the worst thing. Especially when people are raking up thousands on the credit card at 16.9%.

So I am sure there is a limit to how much you check, but overall, if someone is interested in their finances, let them be. :o)

For folks on the fringe of needing financial planning, the first step should be to open a Yodlee account or open a BOA checking account to get this access.

[WCS]

I check my bank balance about every day and compare that balance with my running bank balance that I have on my computer. It takes me like 2 minutes to reconcile the bank statement since I check off all my checks and deposits every day.

[GrowYourAssets]

I check my balance everyday. In fact, I check the balance in all my accounts everyday. I'm talking about everything from investments, banking, credit card, mortgage, student loans, car loans, etc. But it's not as hard as you think. Fidelity has something called "Full View" which allows you to pull data from all your accounts with the click of 1 button. If you have a Fidelity account, check it out.

[mjmcinto]

Daily. I used to check my other accounts weekly, but now that I'm using Yodlee, I check them daily too, as it's just as easy.

[~Dawn]

1. I think it is a wonderful addition to the digital age

2. I check it at least once a day for what has gone through or what is pending, so I am very on top of any 'weird' transactions

[MaryE]

I check mine at least once a day. It works great for me.

[Nicole]

I have all access to all my accounts (banking, credit card, investment) through the "Full View" function on the Fidelity website. I go to it pretty much every day and check out the status of my accounts. It takes about ten minutes and it's worth it for peace of mind. The other day a $30 bank fee showed up on my checking account and I was able to get it reversed immediately by just calling up an asking. In the old days, before on-line banking, I might not even have noticed for months because I was not diligent about reviewing my statements right away. Yes, I'm a control freak now when it comes to my money, but hey, I'm okay with that ;)

[Rev]

I am in the Daily group as well.

[Dancinghawk]

Daily. Particularly since the time I logged on to check if I had enough in the budget to go out to eat, and discovered that I was unexpectadly $800 in the hole because someone stole my checks out of my mailbox. My obsessive checking let me get on top of that within hours of the first check clearing.

I try not to check my 401k more than every week or so, though, despite my instincts. It's too discouraging with the current market.

[Laura]

I check a couple times a week. I usually am waiting to see if someone cashed the check.

[Hal]

1. I think checking your account online depends on your personal habits. I usually don't enter transactions directly into Quicken, but wait for them to be downloaded...

2... So I check pretty often (once a day, or once every other day, usually). My bank has this really nifty feature that shows my authorized and pending transactions--since I rarely write checks, this is actually really helpful. If I want to know how much I've spent, I can enter the transactions before Quicken downloads them, and Quicken will automatically match them. This particular feature is also really helpful because my wife does not track receipts like I do, and this keeps me from having to go "Honey, how much money did you spend at X today?"

[Christian Finance]

I check mine several times a day, every day. I know, it's a little obsessive but I like seeing interest racking up in my savings account!

[Broke Grad Student]

1. Yes, I don't check my bank account any other way. I'm in my mid-20s and spend most of my day in front of a computer, so I guess it's natural for me to check everything online.

2. I check it at least once a week, sometimes more.

[Brandon Barkley]

I check mine probably 2-3 times a week at least usually.

[Kevin]

Daily - I'm a accountant, what else would you expect. Makes it much easier to reconcile this way and I will catch anything fraudulent by the next morning at the earliest.

I can't believe there was a time people only got monthly statements. I wonder if online banking has decreased banks' NSF and overdraft fees since people have a more up-to-date idea of what they actually have in their accounts now?

[Evan]

My Fiancee thinks I have a problem - I check my online banking at least 3 times a day. In reality, it takes 30 seconds! So what is the big deal?

[Blaine Moore]

I check at least once a month, usually 2 or 3 times. Basically whenever I need to transfer money for some reason, which isn't often since I plan ahead for most things. I check the balance when I am in there for whatever reason and make sure that it jives with what I think should be in there, but I'm not compulsive about it.

[Pat]

I check my checking balance daily since this is the account that all of my bills use for automatic withdrawals.

[Matt]

I'm with Evan, I check mine at least twice daily

[Rob]

I check every account once a day, when I download everything into Quicken. Probably is a little extreme, but what can I say?

[dave]

I check every other day or so. I work as a banker and I can say that at least a third to a half of all customer problems I deal with could have been prevented or minimized just by checking balances regularly to be sure funds are available when expected.

Even better, many banks allow you to set up e-mail alerts to notify you when your balance drops below a certain level or other activity occurs.

One caution though: Don't let online banking completely replace your check register, and keep balancing to your statement. People forget that the online banking balance doesn't show outstanding checks, and sometimes can be slow to update with debit card activity or online bill payments.

[MSMomsmoney]

I check everyday.

What's two minutes of my time, for peace of mind??

[db]

I check every day unless I'm on vacation and not near a computer. Well -- actually I'm a bit compulsive so I tend to check all my balances that I can online a couple of times a day -- usually first thing in the morning and then later in the evening after my 401(k) account is settled for the day.

[Richard from NY]

Add me to the every day list.

I keep my Money 2002 up to date on a daily basis, then 1x week I also reconcile with the better half who maintains the checkbook. We pre-plan our expenses looking out 2 weeks, and I fill in the amount and date so it falls below the line. this falls in line with our budget but I can see it in a check register view.