QWin 2017: How do I assign a tag or a description to a uncategorized transaction such as a deposit o

Jeffrey Kirk

Researching this topic, I find nothing on how to tag or describe a return of capital or a deposit.  Any help? The purpose of this exercise is to isolate certain transactions for review.
Thanks in advance.

volvogirl

You can type anything you want into the payee/description field and memo field.  Why don't they have categories?  Set up a new category for them.  There is a Tag field you can add to the account register and give them tags.  What version do you have?

Jeffrey Kirk

Q17 W. how do you add a tag or a description to, say, a deposit or return of capital. I don't see that available on the screen where I first record. Thankd

Jeffrey Kirk

There is not an option to assign a category, designate a payee; the only option is a "Memo"

volvogirl

Are you using Quicken for Windows 2017?  Are you a new user?  Here is a FAQ for new users to help you get started
https://www.quicken.com/complete-guide-getting-started-quicken-2017-windows 

In some account registers you can choose to show a 1 line display or 2 lines to give you more room.  To change to 2 line display,  go to the register you want to change and select "Account Actions".  Then enable Two-line display.   Or there is a  shortcut (Ctrl + 2) which toggles the setting. This only works for non-investment accounts.  

To add or remove columns to the registerSelect "Account Actions".
Select "Register Columns..."

Or in newer versions you can click the gear icon in the upper right hand corner of the account register to get a list of available columns. Click to put a checkmark in the missing column(s). (Also explore the new columns, added to your version of Quicken, if they might be helpful for your needs.)  Here a FAQ on Columns
https://www.quicken.com/support/change-columns-register

Jeffrey Kirk

Great! Thanks so much. I'll give it a try.

markus1957

If the purpose is to isolate transactions for review, consider customizing an Investment Transactions report or a Banking Transactions report to isolate the types of transactions you are looking for. The report provides access to the individual transactions via a mouse click.

NotACPA

Jeffrey, you're correct however in that there's no way to add a Tag to a RtrnCap transaction ... or any other investment transaction for that matter.  And the category for an investment transaction is determined by the investment action ... not separately by you.

Jeffrey Kirk

ThanksMarcus. I am doing that very thing, but I call deposits and returns of capital come back as "uncategorized", requiring me to then click on the line item to see the detailed individual transactions. Is there another way to build a report where Q would automatically show those other items like it does, say, for instinct?


Thanks again.

NotACPA

Jeffrey Kirk said:

ThanksMarcus. I am doing that very thing, but I call deposits and returns of capital come back as "uncategorized", requiring me to then click on the line item to see the detailed individual transactions. Is there another way to build a report where Q would automatically show those other items like it does, say, for instinct?


Thanks again.

If those transactions are all in your investment accounts, there's NO WAY to add a category to them.  Just exclude the investment accounts from the report OR exclude the "Uncategorized" transactions from the report ... although I can't really recommend the latter approach as you might have some UnCats in your banking/card accounts also.

Jeffrey Kirk

Thanks NotaCPA , in that case, are you aware of any report sorting option that would show those 2 items as something other than "uncategorized"?


Thanks again.

markus1957

Jeffrey Kirk said:

ThanksMarcus. I am doing that very thing, but I call deposits and returns of capital come back as "uncategorized", requiring me to then click on the line item to see the detailed individual transactions. Is there another way to build a report where Q would automatically show those other items like it does, say, for instinct?


Thanks again.

I'm not following you, could you restate that please? "I call" and "instinct" are confusing me. There really is no need for ROC to be categorized; you could eliminate that Action from the custom report and it will not show up.

Jeffrey Kirk

Again, I apologize for being a little slow on the uptake. And I am sorry if I offended you in some way., I just didn't read or understand your very helpful responses as meaning Q didn't have a report that would detail any uncategorized transactions in line item detail. Again sorry to have offended you-your responses to me meant you couldn't assign a category to an investment, not that you couldn't break down the investments in some other way.

markus1957

Jeffrey Kirk said:

ThanksMarcus. I am doing that very thing, but I call deposits and returns of capital come back as "uncategorized", requiring me to then click on the line item to see the detailed individual transactions. Is there another way to build a report where Q would automatically show those other items like it does, say, for instinct?


Thanks again.

No problem. Take a step back and first explain in more detail what the end goal is that you are trying to accomplish. You indicate it is "to isolate certain transactions for review". What is the nature of those "certain" transactions?


Adding- If the goal is to simply identify uncategorized transactions that need a category assigned for budget or reporting purposes, there are ways to do that in a report that can be customized to exclude irrelevant query results like certain investment transactions (Buy, Sell, ROC) that would distract from your screening purpose.

mshiggins

Jeffery, why don't you tell us what report you are currently trying to use? What screen do you start from and what do you click on to run the report?

Jim_Harman

Jeffrey,

You might take another look at the Actions column of the Investment Transactions report. You can customize that on the Actions tab to include only the Actions you are interested in.

Note that in Quicken terminology, Actions are different from Categories. Actions are things you do in investing - Buy, Sell, Reinvest, receive income, etc, corresponding to the choice you make when entering investment transactions.  Categories are used to track various types of cash income and expenses. They are also used to track transfers of cash between accounts. As has been explained above, some Actions have one or more Categories associated with them, others do not.

So if you want to see just your Return of Capital transactions for a certain period, you would click the gear in the Investment Transactions report, click the Actions tab, click Clear All, then select just RtrnCap and RtrnCapX to see just those. The X actions are used when money is transferred to another account as part of the transaction.

Jeffrey Kirk

Jeffrey Kirk said:

ThanksMarcus. I am doing that very thing, but I call deposits and returns of capital come back as "uncategorized", requiring me to then click on the line item to see the detailed individual transactions. Is there another way to build a report where Q would automatically show those other items like it does, say, for instinct?


Thanks again.

BINGO, Markus. I think you are getting at what I am looking for. For example, in a cash flow report, since I can't categorize investment transactions, I would like to see the report detail each such transaction with a simple description (or tag) in the initial report that is generated (just like an ininc or inexperienced). In doing so, one would be able to see the detail without having the perform an additional action . I hope this explanation will help.

Jeffrey Kirk

Thanks Jim. I'll give that a try and let you know Very helpful!

q_lurker

One way to break out a series of transactions for review would be to use the memo field.  For example, if you had a series of deposits and RtrnCap transactions you knew you would want to review, you could use a keyword in the memo field (review) for those transactions.  You could then ask for a transactions report, and specify in that report (Category tab) to only include transactions with the keyword (review) in the transaction memo.  

Conversely, you could also use different keyword (Reviewed) in the memo field and choose to exclude such transactions from the report by specifying 'tilde keyword' (~Reviewed) in that memo designation.  Transactions that had the 'Reviewed' in the memo field would thus be exlcuded from the report. 

In that report specification for the memo field, "Keyword" will include only transactions with that in the memo field or "~Keyword" will exclude all such transactions with that in the memo field.  

Jeffrey Kirk

Great! These are the typ of specialized reports I have been looking for; I knew it was possible.

Unknown

q.lurker said:

One way to break out a series of transactions for review would be to use the memo field.  For example, if you had a series of deposits and RtrnCap transactions you knew you would want to review, you could use a keyword in the memo field (review) for those transactions.  You could then ask for a transactions report, and specify in that report (Category tab) to only include transactions with the keyword (review) in the transaction memo.  

Conversely, you could also use different keyword (Reviewed) in the memo field and choose to exclude such transactions from the report by specifying 'tilde keyword' (~Reviewed) in that memo designation.  Transactions that had the 'Reviewed' in the memo field would thus be exlcuded from the report. 

In that report specification for the memo field, "Keyword" will include only transactions with that in the memo field or "~Keyword" will exclude all such transactions with that in the memo field.  

I am trying to build some report that forces me to use the filter in the 'CONTAINS' field. I am trying to get transactions from 2 accounts into a report. But I need to filter specific transactions based on text in the MEMO field. I tried 'Memo Contains' CONTRIBUTION. it worked but it filters some wanted transactions in the other bank account.

I need to use ~ <Unwanted Keywords>. Do you know if Quicken supports - ~ <Key word 1> AND ~ <Keyword 2>. Do they support the operators like AND/OR etc. i tried AND, it didnt seem to work. Just want to check if there is a specific syntax.TIA

q_lurker

q.lurker said:

One way to break out a series of transactions for review would be to use the memo field.  For example, if you had a series of deposits and RtrnCap transactions you knew you would want to review, you could use a keyword in the memo field (review) for those transactions.  You could then ask for a transactions report, and specify in that report (Category tab) to only include transactions with the keyword (review) in the transaction memo.  

Conversely, you could also use different keyword (Reviewed) in the memo field and choose to exclude such transactions from the report by specifying 'tilde keyword' (~Reviewed) in that memo designation.  Transactions that had the 'Reviewed' in the memo field would thus be exlcuded from the report. 

In that report specification for the memo field, "Keyword" will include only transactions with that in the memo field or "~Keyword" will exclude all such transactions with that in the memo field.  

@cool_anil:  I have not experimented fully, but I have not been able to get an AND function to work for that field (memo contains:___).  Filtering to 266 works (part of account number).  Filtering to 901 (different part of account number) works producing same set.  Any combination of 266 AND 901 yields nothing when it 'should' yield same set.  So I don't believe there is any support for AND/OR combinations be they positive or negated (~).

If you uncover anything different, I'd appreciate hearing back from you.