Depending on what your financial institution offers, and what you have set up at your bank or credit union, you may or may not receive a bank statement each month.
If you do not receive a paper statement in the mail, then you are most likely using online banking features to keep track of the funds going in and out of your checking and savings accounts. Either way, it is important to review the activity in your checking account on a regular basis.
A paper bank statement looks very similar to what you'll see if you are managing your accounts online. Banking online is a more versatile option and will keep you more up to date, but it is also convenient to have hard copies on hand for your personal records. If you do not receive a monthly bank statement from your financial institution, you can either request a print-out or print one at home from your own online account.
Your statement or online account details should display all of the personal checks you wrote in the last month or even further back if you are banking online. It will also list money withdrawn from ATMs, transferred by phone, and any transactions made with a debit card connected to that account. Both paper statements and online account management pages should also display any deposits you made.
If your statement comes in the mail, you may get cancelled checks in the envelope as well. These could be the original checks, or images of the checks on a piece of paper. These are known as substitute checks.
You should also be able to see any outstanding checks on your statement or online account. Outstanding checks are personal checks that have yet to be processed and cleared. When you see stars or dots between the check numbers on your statement it indicates you are either missing a check or that the check is still outstanding.
A hard copy of your monthly statement will include sensitive information such as your account number and possibly your social security number. For this reason, it is wise to file monthly bank statements in a safe place, or shred them when you are finished reviewing.
If you view your account activity over the internet, you should make sure you have a complicated password. It's a good idea to use something different than what you use for your other online accounts like email and social networking sites.
You should also check to make sure any automatic payments you have set up for things like your mortgage, credit card or utility bills are processed on time.
It's important to review your bank statement for errors. Sometimes banks make mistakes, or you could have had personal checks stolen and used to commit fraud against you. It's up to you to catch the problem. If you notice something that isn't right, call your financial institution to work things out as soon as possible.
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