Topic: Parsing transactions with a MEMO but no NAME or PAYEE

I'm an accounting software vendor and just got an OFX file from a customer, from Capital One Bank, where the transactions have a MEMO field but no NAME or PAYEE.

Of course we are trying to import that into our software that has fields for Name and Memo, so I need to split it up. Currently since our Name field is max 64 chars, I'm more or less splitting it at the first space before the 64th character, with the first part becoming the Name, and the 2nd part the Memo (up to our Memo field's max of 64 chars as well).

That's not bad, but there's some really weird stuff in the file, like many MEMO values ending in a code (sometimes preceded by "...") that I doubt means anything to the user. Such as the following MEMO examples:

ACH Withdrawal PAYROLL PAYROLL 1796030
or
ACH deposit PAYPAL TRANSFER ...3977788
or
ACH Withdrawal NATIONAL INDEMNI NATL INDEM  2JFC9PGF7254VWT

I'm wondering whether I should try to identify those codes at the end (tricky, because how do I tell them from words?) and strip them out.

Any thoughts? Thanks.

Re: Parsing transactions with a MEMO but no NAME or PAYEE

Have you considered implementing a strategy to identify and strip out the codes at the end of MEMO values in the OFX file, given their potentially irrelevant nature to the user?

smile