Bank Transfers

Moving money between two of your own accounts — sweeping funds from a USD operating account into a savings account at month end, or topping up a petty cash float from your main chequing account — is not a payment to a vendor or a receipt from a customer. A bank transfer handles it correctly: it debits one of your accounts, credits the other, and posts a clean journal entry that keeps both sides of the books accurate.

How to create a Bank Transfer

1. Go to Banking > Transfers.
2. Click New.
3. Select the From Account (the account money is leaving).
4. Select the To Account (the account money is arriving in).
5. Enter the From Amount — the amount debited from the source account.
6. If the two accounts use different Currencies, enter the To Amount — the amount credited to the destination account (after exchange).
7. Set the Posting Date.
8. Add a Reference if you have one (e.g., wire reference number).
9. Post the transfer.

Field reference

• From Account / To Account — both must be Financial Institutions already set up in CifraHQ. You cannot transfer to an account that is not in your institution list.
• From Amount — the amount leaving the source account, in that account's currency.
• To Amount — the amount arriving in the destination account. For same-currency transfers this equals From Amount. For cross-currency transfers, enter the actual amount credited by your bank — do not estimate based on a mid-market rate.
• Exchange Rate — calculated automatically from From Amount ÷ To Amount when the Currencies differ. CifraHQ shows you the implied rate so you can verify it matches what your bank applied.

What the posting creates

Posting a transfer creates a journal entry with two lines:

• Debit the destination account (money in)
• Credit the source account (money out)

Both accounts show the transaction in their Bank Transactions register.

Tips

• Use your actual bank statement amounts for cross-currency transfers. If your bank wired USD 10,000 and your CAD account received CAD 13,650, enter exactly those figures. The implied exchange rate CifraHQ calculates will match your statement, and your foreign exchange gain or loss will be accurate.
• Bank transfers bypass accounts payable and receivable entirely — they are direct account-to-account movements. If money going to a third party is being routed through your books, it should be a bill payment or vendor payment, not a bank transfer.

Related: Bank Transactions · Bank Reconciliation · Financial Institutions · Audit Trail · Account Priming