Convert a Chase statement to Excel

What Chase lets you download, and how far back

Chase gives you two different things: a transaction download, which is already a spreadsheet-ready file, and PDF statements, which go back much further. Chase's paperless statements FAQ and its Spending Planner page describe them like this:

Got a CSV, QFX or QBO file from Chase? Upload it here instead of the PDFs — those files use no pages (you still need a plan or page pack), and you get the same payee names, categories and export formats.

When you still need to convert Chase PDFs

• Activity older than two years. The download stops there, but statements reach back up to seven years — useful for an amended tax return, an audit or a lender's questions about older deposits.
• Statements from someone else. Bookkeepers and tax preparers usually get PDFs by email, not a Chase login.
• Working from your phone. The app only gives you transactions as a PDF, so the spreadsheet formats need either a computer or a conversion.
• Printed or scanned statements, which convert the same way as digital PDFs — see scanned bank statements to Excel.

How Chase statements are laid out

A personal checking statement opens with a checking summary — beginning balance, deposits and additions, withdrawals, fees, ending balance — followed by a transaction detail table with a date, description, signed amount and running balance on each line. That running balance lets every row be checked, not only the totals.

Chase business statements are usually laid out differently. Transactions are split into separate tables — deposits and additions, checks paid, ATM and debit card withdrawals, electronic withdrawals, fees — with a daily ending balance table at the end instead of a balance on each line. Amounts in those tables have no sign; the section tells you the direction. The conversion puts them back into one list in date order, with withdrawals negative.

Dates on Chase statements are printed as month and day only. The year is taken from the statement period, so a statement running from December into January still gets the right year on every row.

Chase credit card statements

Card statements list account activity in groups — payments and other credits, purchases, fees charged, interest charged — with credits shown as negative amounts. Converted, each purchase becomes a row with a clean merchant name and a category, and the statement is checked from the previous balance to the new balance. Cards with authorized users stay one account, so the totals still reconcile. More in credit card statements in Excel.

Chase statements into QuickBooks

For the last two years, Chase's own QBO download is the quickest route into QuickBooks Desktop. For older periods, or a client's PDFs, export from here instead:

• QuickBooks Online: the QuickBooks Online CSV has the three columns QuickBooks expects — Date, Description, Amount. Step-by-step: import bank statements into QuickBooks Online.
• QuickBooks Desktop: a .qbo Web Connect file, the same type of file Chase's download gives you.
• Spreadsheets: Excel with a Summary sheet by category and month, or plain CSV.

A year of Chase statements in one file

Upload twelve monthly statements — checking and credit card together if you like — and export them as one workbook, optionally limited to a date range such as your tax year. Transactions are merged in date order, and the Summary sheet gives money in and out by category and by month. Other US banks work the same way; see all bank guides.

Questions