Account Activity

Account activity generically applies to whenever a movement of funds (or something that has monetary value) takes place in an account, whatever the type of account.

In banking, account activity refers to a debit or credit in a checking or saving account, or a purchase or payment on a credit card. In a brokerage or trading account, account activity includes buy and sell transactions, dividend and interest payments, deposits and withdrawals, or any other type of transaction that involves the change of the balance of the account. Retailers that offer store cards record account activity for customers who make use of the cards to purchase their goods. Airlines and hotels run programs for customers to accumulate points in loyalty accounts. When a person books a flight or stays at a hotel, that customer generates account activity, and when the customer redeems points, account activity occurs again.

At a company, account activity refers to the movement of money to and from any one of the several accounts maintained for business operations. A client sales account, and the accounts receivable and accounts payable accounts are the most obvious types of accounts in which there is frequent account activity.

Account activity is almost always automated for the vast majority of account types. If a transaction is conducted by electronic means, the IT set-up will record it without human intervention. In some cases, a person must manually enter a transaction into the system. Two simple examples are a cash deposit with a bank teller and a paper invoice input by a clerk in an accounts payable department. All account activity is registered in IT systems for tracking, organization and report creation.