On the Investment Sidebar Menu, Click on  Utilities | Account | Combine Accounts.  This may also be accessed during downloads from the Assign Accounts Wizard by clicking on the Combine Accounts Button.

Overview

This utility is designed to accommodate the situation where an account is moved from one custodian of the asset to another.  In this case, the account will usually have the account number reassigned.

Usually, the new account has been established and now the client may have two accounts with the first account leaving off where the second account begins.  This utility allows you to put the history in the single, surviving account.

The surviving account will normally be the new custodian's account number.

There are instances where you will need to make manual adjustments after combining the accounts.

1.The same investments in both accounts have overlapping transactions based on their dates.  This should be rare and would only occur when users manually enter transactions.

2.The method of moving the investment by the custodians causes transaction overlaps and positions that don't make sense.  For example, if the transfer into the new account (and its position) is reported prior to the transfer out of the old account.  Or, the transfer out of the old account may not be reported and the old account's position may not be reported.

BEFORE you combine accounts, you should look at the transactions in the two accounts so you determine the order and dates the shares were moved from one account to the other.

Account Producers

Account Producers 1-4 are not combined into the surviving account.  It is assumed that the surviving account already contains the proper producers.

Account Managers

If the account being combined contains manager names and the surviving account does not, the managers will be combined into the surviving account.

 

Investor

The Investor must be the same for both of the accounts being combined.  Click on the field to choose the investor.

Downloading And Combining

Special provisions have been made so that when a new account is downloaded from a new custodian, you can choose to combine the new account with your existing account that existed under the old custodian.

In this case, the surviving account's account number will automatically be changed to the new custodian account because data subsequently downloaded will need to find the new account.

Assets Combined

Assets present in both accounts will combine into one asset provided both are being carried as unliquidated.  The determination of the two assets being considered as the same security (Both IBM Common, etc.) is based on the Security List.

You can determine if the securities are considered to be the same security by using the Selection Criteria on the Investment Selection Report and Choosing the Security Name/Description and the Client's Name as the investor as shown below.

If you run the Selection Report Criteria as shown above and then run the Investor Account Summary (Report 30029), you can check to see if the asset appears in both accounts.

If Advisors Assistant considers them different assets, it means that the security is listed twice in the Add / Modify Security Screen.  The assets will remain separated, and be listed twice in the surviving account.  You can use the Combine Investment Wizard to combine the investments after the accounts are combined.

Liquidated Assets

If one or the other assets are liquidated (contain a liquidated date) they will not be combined.  The surviving account will show both assets, with one or both being liquidated.  Normally the older asset would be liquidated.

See Also

Combine Investment Wizard

Combine Accounts Wizard Step 2

Combine Accounts Wizard Step 3

Combine Accounts Wizard Step 4