don t rely on bank statements either as noted above balances displayed on statements are taken from a ledger balance on the statement date keep in mind that if you ve conducted any transaction conducted after the statement date such as deposits withdrawals checks or anything else will affect your available balance 
in order to ensure you re working with the most updated balance at all times it s always important to keep your records up to date you may consider keeping your own ledger with a running total of your balance after considering any and all transactions through your account example of a ledger balancesay the opening balance for monday morning is 1 000 you have a payroll deposit of 500 and 150 charges on your bank card regardless of the transaction the ledger balance remains the same throughout the day that is the deposit and the bank card charge haven t officially cleared however the available balance will be updated to reflect these changes can i spend my ledger balance you can only spend your available balance and not your ledger balance if the ledger balance is greater than the available balance you can only spend up to the available balance 