- Verify Your Information At Your Old Brokerage
Prior to the transfer, you need to verify that the cost basis of each lot of each stock you own shown on the bivio "Investment Lot Cost Basis" report agrees with what your old brokerage shows on an "Unrealized Gain/Loss Report" report you can get from them.
You also need to verify that the cost basis and capital gains for each lot of each stock you've sold during the year agrees between the bivio "Capital Gain and Loss" report and a "Realized Gain/Loss Report" report you can get from them.
Once you have stocks transferred, any broker mistakes can't be addressed at your new brokerage.
- Download Historical Statements:
Make sure you have copies of all of your historical statements and reports from your old brokerage. You will probably not have access to them once you change and you may need the information in the future to verify cost basis for tax reporting.
- Set Up a New Account in bivio On The Accounting>Accounts page
You will need to track your your new brokerage transactions in a new account in bivio on the Accounting>Accounts page. You can set it up by following these instructions:
Creating New Accounts
Label the new account with your new brokerage name and enter your your new brokerage login credentials when you create it.
- Make Sure The Last Transactions At Your Old Brokerage And The First Transactions At Your New Brokerage Are Recorded Correctly
Once you get the new account linked to your new brokerage and AccountSync starts working, you will have AccountSync unidentified credit entries for any cash that moved from one account to the other. You need to identify them as Transfers FROM your old brokerage account TO your new brokerage account in bivio.
If you have an unidentified Debit in your old brokerage account for cash moved out and an Unidentified Credit in your new brokerage account for the same amount of cash moved in, use one of them to record the transfer and delete the other one.
- Final Dividends And Sales At Your Old Brokerage
If there were any late dividends received in your old brokerage account, you may have to enter them manually. Do that using the Income button on the Accounting>Investments page. On the income entry form, you'll select that they were deposited into your old brokerage account.
You'll also get an unidentified Credit entry when the cash received is moved to your new brokerage account. You identify that as a "Transfer".
You'll end up with two entries for each dividend in your old brokerage account. An Investment Income entry showing the receipt of the dividend and a Transfer entry showing the movement of the cash you received from the dividend to your new brokerage account.
If you have final sales in your old brokerage account and they are not entered by AccountSync, enter them manually using the "Sell" button on the Accounting>Investments page. You will then also have an additional transfer entry when the cash from the sale moves from the old account to the new one.
- . Reconcile Both Your Old And Your New Accounts Against Their Respective Brokerage Statements.
You can see the transactions in each account by clicking on their names on the Accounting>Accounts page. Make sure the entries in each account correspond to what shows on their brokerage statements.
- Verify Your Cost Basis Details At Your New Brokerage
Compare the number of shares, purchase date and total cost basis of each lot of each stock you now own shown on the bivio "Investment Lot Cost Basis" report against an "Unrealized gain/loss" report you can get from your new brokerage showing similar details.
If there are any differences, send us a copy of the brokers report and another report indicating what specific differences you found. We will review and let you know what will need to be done to address them