Bank statement to Google Sheets
A CSV or Excel file that opens in Sheets with the numbers intact, ready to sum and pivot.
Columns: Date, Description, Amount, Balance
No statement handy? or open the finished Excel
What goes wrong
The spreadsheet's locale decides what a number means
Google Sheets parses numbers according to the locale set on the spreadsheet, not the locale of the file. A sheet set to a European locale reads 1,234.56 as the text it cannot parse, or worse, as 1.23456. The result is a column that silently refuses to sum, or sums to something absurd. Set the locale before importing, under File → Settings, and match it to the way the numbers in the file are written: a period for the decimal point.
Getting the file into Google Sheets
- 1Convert the statement above and press CSV, or Excel if you would rather keep the highlighting.
- 2In Google Sheets, open File → Settings and confirm the locale uses a period as the decimal separator.
- 3Use File → Import and choose Replace spreadsheet, rather than pasting the contents in.
- 4Check that the Amount column right-aligns. Right-aligned means Sheets read it as a number; left-aligned means it read text, and the locale is the reason.
Google Sheets questions
Should I import the CSV or the Excel file?+
The CSV if you only want the data. The Excel file if you want the highlighted rows and the filter to survive the import — Sheets keeps both.
Why does my Amount column not add up?+
Almost always the locale. If the figures sit on the left of their cells they are text, not numbers. Change the spreadsheet locale under File → Settings and import again; reformatting the cells afterwards does not fix already-parsed text.
Can I connect this to a Sheet automatically?+
Not yet. There is no API, so the file is downloaded and imported by hand. For a recurring monthly job that is a minute of work; for a nightly pipeline it is the wrong tool.