Shared Card Desk

Bring in a credit card statement one time, decide which of your companies each charge belongs to, and let BizBooks Pro write the journal entries in every company file.

What It Does

When a single card pays bills for several of your businesses, or mixes business and personal spending, Shared Card Desk is where you sort it out. You work from one list of charges instead of entering the statement company by company, and posting is held back until every charge has been dealt with.

Find it in the sidebar under Tools → Shared Card Desk. The Bank Import screen also has a 💳 Shared Card Desk button. Your cards belong to your user login, so the desk works across every company you can post to, regardless of which one is currently open.

Version: included in BizBooks Pro 2.1.52 and newer.

Setting Up a Card

Choose Add a card.
Name the card, for example "Discover". The last four digits are optional and help when you have several cards.
Pick the answer to Who pays this card's bill? See the next section.
Select Save.

Use Card settings beside the card's name to change it later. After a card has posted charges, its payment arrangement is fixed. The existing entries depend on it, so create a separate card if the arrangement changes.

Payment Arrangements

The arrangement you choose tells BizBooks Pro which account sits on the other side of every expense:

Arrangement	Typical situation	Entry for a charge
Each company pays its own share	Every business sends its own payment to the card issuer	Expense debited; the card's shared liability account (such as Discover Card (Shared)) credited in that company
I pay it, and my companies pay me back	You settle the card and the businesses reimburse you	Expense debited; Due to Owner (Shared Card) credited
One company pays it, and the others owe that company	A parent or operating company carries the card for its affiliates	Affiliate: expense debited, Due to payer credited. Payer: Due from affiliate debited, credit card credited

Naming the shared liability account

For the first arrangement, BizBooks Pro proposes a name built from the card, such as Discover Card (Shared), and you're free to change it. A note under the field confirms whether that name is available in all of your companies. The account has to read identically everywhere, so a name already in use is refused.

It is added to a company's chart of accounts automatically, as a Credit Card account, the first time that company is charged.
Changing the name in Card settings updates it in every company together.
In each company its balance is what that company currently owes on the card.

Affiliate (intercompany) cards

For the third arrangement, choose the paying company and the credit card account in its books. BizBooks Pro adds "Due to" and "Due from" accounts between the companies as charges are posted, and marks both sides with the partner company so they can be identified as intercompany balances when you consolidate.

Uploading a Statement

Download the statement from your card issuer's website as CSV, Excel, QFX, QBO or QIF. Then select the card in the desk and choose Import statement.

Sign detection. Issuers disagree on whether a charge is a positive or negative number, so BizBooks Pro checks the file and adjusts. If charges still show as credits, pick that statement in the statement list and choose Flip signs.
No double entries. Charges already on the card are recognized and skipped, so uploading an overlapping date range is harmless. Genuinely identical charges in the same file are kept separately.
Automatic sorting. Merchants you've routed before are routed again, and payments to the card are marked as ignored.

Routing Charges

Use the tabs to switch between To sort, Ready to post, Ignored, Posted and All. Charges waiting for a decision are marked with an orange bar.

One company: pick the company, then the account. Expense accounts are listed at the top.
Several companies: choose Split, add a row per company with its account and amount, and optionally a memo. Split evenly shares the charge to the penny. The dialog shows any remaining amount until the portions add up.
No company: choose Ignore and give a reason: Personal, Not business, Card payment, Duplicate or Recorded elsewhere. Restore undoes it.
Many at once: tick several charges, then route, ignore or clear them together from the bar that appears.

If a company pays the whole card: personal purchases are still owed to the card issuer by that company. Ignoring them means its card account won't match the statement. Route them to Owner's Draw, or to a shareholder loan account for a corporation, so they stay out of expenses while the card still reconciles.

Posting

The summary bar shows total charges, total credits and payments, the line count, and how many charges are still to sort. Posting becomes available only when that count is zero, so every charge on the statement is either routed or deliberately ignored.

To post a single statement, select it in the statement list first. Otherwise every ready charge on the card is posted.

Each charge is written as one all-or-nothing transaction across the companies it involves. If a charge falls in a company's closed (locked) period, it stays unposted and is listed for you, while the other charges go through.

In each company's register these entries are labeled 💳 Shared Card, with references beginning SCD-. Clicking one jumps to that charge in the desk.

Reversing a Posted Charge

On the Posted tab, choose Undo on the charge and confirm. BizBooks Pro deletes its entries from every affected company together, and the charge returns to Ready to post with its routing kept, ready to adjust and post again.

To keep linked companies in agreement, these entries can't be edited, voided or deleted from registers or other screens. Undo is the way to change them. It won't proceed if an entry is reconciled or in a locked period; reverse the reconciliation or reopen the period first.

Paying Off the Card

With the "each company pays its own share" arrangement, the desk lists every company's outstanding share and their combined total. That total should agree with the card's balance, apart from anything you pay personally.

Via your bank import or bank feed: categorize the payment to the shared liability account. This is the natural choice if that bank account is already imported.
Via the desk: select Record a payment, then choose the company, the bank account that paid, the amount (it suggests the company's outstanding share) and the date. BizBooks Pro debits the shared account and credits the bank.

Avoid duplicates: record each payment one way only. If it's coming through your bank feed, categorize it there.

Merchant Learning

Leave Remember choices by merchant checked (it is by default) and every charge you route to one company and account, or ignore, is remembered. The next statement arrives partly sorted, with a remembered tag on those charges for your review.

Matching uses the merchant name and disregards things like store numbers and "SQ *" or "TST*" prefixes. Choose Remembered merchants to review the list, see usage counts, or remove any entry.

Questions

Is it useful if I only have one company?

Yes, when the card mixes business and personal spending. Route the business charges, ignore the personal ones, and post.

My personal finances are in BizBooks Pro as their own company. How do I handle personal charges?

Route them to your personal company exactly as you would to any business. There's no need to ignore them.

Can other users see my cards?

Each card belongs to the user who set it up. Only companies where your role permits posting can be chosen; companies you can only view aren't offered.

Does it record a payee on each entry?

Not at this time. The statement's description is used as the entry description and memo. Payee assignment for desk entries is planned.

What happens when I remove a card?

If nothing on it was posted, it is deleted. If it has posted charges, it is archived so the entries and their history remain intact.