Quicken for Mac 2017 v4.5, 4.5.1, 4.5.2 & 4.5.3 Released

jacobs

Concordman said:

Got the update alert for 4.5.1& 2 a few hrs back. Just tried to update( of course I am backed up to the hilt). Update no longer available. Did they pull it?

The good thing is that the process is working as they intend it to. Well, ideally there would be no bugs at all, and they could move from limited release to full release within a few days. But since it's been more than four months since the last update, and there are so many changes and a major new feature, they knew it was likely there would be some glitches that surface as more people started using it. By doing these staged releases, they get the necessary feedback without inconveniencing the entire user base, and they can make multiple quick iterations to fix any of the bugs identified. (But it can be confusing if you see and skip an update notice, then come back a little later to get the update, and it tells you you have the latest version.)

Snoopy FC

OK.  I now have QM2017 4.5.2, and I just converted my mortgage from a liability account to a new loan account.  The loan account appears to be setup correctly and has added the scheduled transaction.  

However, on the loan payment setup, I cannot pick the category that I have set up to track mortgage spending in my budget.  It's setup only to do a transfer to the loan account from the bank account.  Of course budgets aren't currently able to track transfers.  Now I have a problem.  The shot below shows the principal and extra principal with no options to pick a category.  


That leads to this screen clearly indicating a transfer only has been setup: 

Notice the principal is only setup as a transfer reminder and remember how we can't budget transfers.  So now what do I do to track mortgage spending in my budget?  

Suggestions: 
1. Add transfers to budgets so that I can see this money being spent on the mortgage principal
2. Allow us to set the category for mortgage principal and setup monthly principal reductions in the mortgage (loan) account

Any workaround ideas anyone?
 

Snoopy FC

Snoopy FC said:

OK.  I now have QM2017 4.5.2, and I just converted my mortgage from a liability account to a new loan account.  The loan account appears to be setup correctly and has added the scheduled transaction.  

However, on the loan payment setup, I cannot pick the category that I have set up to track mortgage spending in my budget.  It's setup only to do a transfer to the loan account from the bank account.  Of course budgets aren't currently able to track transfers.  Now I have a problem.  The shot below shows the principal and extra principal with no options to pick a category.  


That leads to this screen clearly indicating a transfer only has been setup: 

Notice the principal is only setup as a transfer reminder and remember how we can't budget transfers.  So now what do I do to track mortgage spending in my budget?  

Suggestions: 
1. Add transfers to budgets so that I can see this money being spent on the mortgage principal
2. Allow us to set the category for mortgage principal and setup monthly principal reductions in the mortgage (loan) account

Any workaround ideas anyone?
 

Also, the future scheduled transaction date didn't update when I changed it from the loan account.  

Snoopy FC

Thomas said:

There are problems with the buttons for the Budget. See screen capture with notes. If you click the center button it does not give you the view of current month/year but for me it set it to Jan/2016. After many clicks to get to todays date, if I leave the budget screen and go to anything else say Home Screen then come back the right button sets it to March/2016 

I have a 2017 budget that defaulted right to 2017 within 4.4.3, but 4.5.2 defaults back to 2016 because it changed the default date for the budget back to 2016.  See the screenshot below: 

This has got to be a bug.  It should default the budgeted date set in the budget screen.   

Unknown

J. Holmes said:

Loans is one of the features that I have been looking forward to having moved from QW.  I am really excited.  Thanks.

When I setup a loan, the principal + interest calculation doesn't always equal the true total monthly loan payment.  I used the pencil to manually enter my true monthly loan payment amount and the difference is allocated to Extra Principal.  However, the amount isn't really "extra principal".  

In QW, you had the ability to edit the total payment amount and thereafter, the principal + interest calculations would adjust accordingly.  Thereafter, you could add a value for true "extra principal".  

Not certain which methodology (QM or QW) provides the best result.  However, I am hoping that once I post the transaction in a few days, I will have the ability to adjust the principal + interest amounts appropriately.  

Kuddos to the Mac Development Team.  I also enjoy the UX enhancements (e.g. clear filters).

 

I also had a problem with a Nationstar loan.  In my case there were 2 issues.  First, this was a 5/1 variable from 2004 and the rate is higher now than it was a few years ago.  If I set it up as a 30 year loan, the calculated total amount was too high.  I fixed this by making it a 17 year loan starting from the last adjustment period.  This got me close, but to get the total amount right, I had to add $199 to the Original Balance.  Only then was the total exactly correct.  I could have just used the pencil to adjust the total, but I wanted the numbers to come out right on their own.  I wonder if Nationstar is calculating the mortgage based on the pay-off amount instead of the outstanding balance?

Unknown

In 4.5.2, when setting up the Loan Details, I found that if you use the calendar widget in a date field, the resulting date doesn't propagate changes to the other fields.  If you use the keyboard +/- or up/down on the date, then it does impact the other fields.

Unknown

In 4.5.2, I had converted my mortgage liability account to a Loan.  Then I went to set up automatic download, and I was surprised that I couldn't link my Loan account.  My only options were Ignore or set up a new account.  So I just cancelled out.  Eventually, I realized that I could use the Edit Loan and Payment Terms screen to change the Loan Type to "Mortgage".  Once I did this, I was able to set up Automatic Download again, and this time my Mortgage (not Loan) account was offered for linking.

I think it would be nice if non-downloaded Loan accounts were also offered for linking, and if the link is established, then the Loan Type could be changed to Mortgage (or whatever is appropriate) automatically.

qmac_scott

qmac_scott said:

The mortgage loan feature will be VERY much appreciated! Is there a timeline for when we will see other simple loan types supported (in particular: auto loans)?

Also, is there any chance you've added some way to search all transactions (including hidden accounts)? Very frequently I am trying to find history of some old purchase in an account I no longer use (so it is hidden). An option to temporarily show hidden account in the "All Transactions" window would allow this.

Thanks for the hard work adding these new features!

Thanks lot for the detailed explanation! I very much appreciate the work to get this working and working correctly. I am curious, though, isn't the backend code for this something that could be easily borrowed from the windows version? It doesn't seem like this should require so much reinventing.

smayer97

@Quicken Marcus, What do the release notes
"Fixed an issue with Web Connect accounts. They will now work as connected accounts." mean?

Users thought maybe it meant addressing the following problem reported several times here:
Remove Webconnect on account in Quicken for Mac 2017
and here:
I think I have found a bug in Mac 2017. There is no way to change or deactivate the connection type (web connect, direct connect, etc.) in accounts that have already been using web connect.

and I raised over 6 months ago here (only accessible by SUs and Quicken Staff):
BUG? Report: Cannot De-activate Web Connect in QM2017
looking for feedback multiple times with no follow-up. Please clarify. 

smayer97

@Quicken Marcus if you have not seen this, I recommend you read the following discussion thread:
QMac 2017: Apparently No Option for Variable Interest Rates under new Quicken Mac Version 4.5.0

Unknown

km-nm said:

In 4.5.2, I had converted my mortgage liability account to a Loan.  Then I went to set up automatic download, and I was surprised that I couldn't link my Loan account.  My only options were Ignore or set up a new account.  So I just cancelled out.  Eventually, I realized that I could use the Edit Loan and Payment Terms screen to change the Loan Type to "Mortgage".  Once I did this, I was able to set up Automatic Download again, and this time my Mortgage (not Loan) account was offered for linking.

I think it would be nice if non-downloaded Loan accounts were also offered for linking, and if the link is established, then the Loan Type could be changed to Mortgage (or whatever is appropriate) automatically.

Although I'm still using QM2017 v4.4.3 (as of this writing), I've been following, with great interest, the Posts about initially converting mortgage details.

For context related to my following question, I set up a Liability Account for monthly manual-entry of my mortgage payment according to instructions as set out in this conversation between smayer97 & HQ at this Thread: https://getsatisfaction.com/quickencommunity/topics/quicken-for-mac-2017-mortgage-loan-set-up-unintended-consequences ...So, I'd like to convert (if possible) that Liability account details when I install v4.5.x.

My question: Based upon using "a split transaction and transfer category principal and interest" method, please detail the correct steps to convert this Liability account to the new (in v4.5.x) loan type (Account) "Mortgage."

[By the way, my mortgage is a 30 year, fixed rate mortgage.]

NOTE:  Quicken Marcus, if my question (and replies) should be set out in a separate Thread, please do so. Please provide a forwarding Link. Thank you.

Quicken Marcus

Thomas said:

There are problems with the buttons for the Budget. See screen capture with notes. If you click the center button it does not give you the view of current month/year but for me it set it to Jan/2016. After many clicks to get to todays date, if I leave the budget screen and go to anything else say Home Screen then come back the right button sets it to March/2016 

I agree it's a bug.  Thanks for reporting it.

Quicken Marcus

km-nm said:

In 4.5.2, when setting up the Loan Details, I found that if you use the calendar widget in a date field, the resulting date doesn't propagate changes to the other fields.  If you use the keyboard +/- or up/down on the date, then it does impact the other fields.

Thanks for reporting this issue.  We've been able to reproduce this and have filed a bug in our system.

RickO

Thomas said:

I am using 4.5.1 Prior to this I could select a Web Connect Account and type Command U and I would be taken to the financial site to download the Web Connect file. It is now greyed out and cannot use the command.

@Marcus... bump (did you see this regarding disabling Cmd-U for QC accounts?

J. Holmes

J. Holmes said:

From the release notes above, there is not suppose to be any new budget features.  However, when I was playing around with the budget, I had the ability to select "Transfer" as a category.  The default Transfer category is associated with credit card payments.  

Can you now budget for Transfer:  Credit Card Payment in this new release?  On a side note, when I go back in to edit my budget and select/unselect categories, I no longer see Transfer as a category.  

Is this future functionality that slipped into this release or something that was added in a prior release that I missed.  Either way, it does not seem like the functionality is fully functional.  I use Transfer:  Credit Card Payment for all my credit card payments.  Generally regardless if I budget an amount for a category or not, you can see the actual spending in the far right column.

Thanks for the update.
 

Henryth

No problems so far, but I'm not using many fancy features. Only issue I discovered is that the back-up file from issue 4.5.2 can not be opened by issue 4.4.3. Thus I can not transfer files from one Mac to another.

RickO

Henryth said:

No problems so far, but I'm not using many fancy features. Only issue I discovered is that the back-up file from issue 4.5.2 can not be opened by issue 4.4.3. Thus I can not transfer files from one Mac to another.

If you want 4.5.2 on both computers, you can just copy the 4.5.2 version of the Quicken app to the other computer.

Quicken Marcus

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

@Quicken Marcus, What do the release notes
"Fixed an issue with Web Connect accounts. They will now work as connected accounts." mean?

Users thought maybe it meant addressing the following problem reported several times here:
Remove Webconnect on account in Quicken for Mac 2017
and here:
I think I have found a bug in Mac 2017. There is no way to change or deactivate the connection type (web connect, direct connect, etc.) in accounts that have already been using web connect.

and I raised over 6 months ago here (only accessible by SUs and Quicken Staff):
BUG? Report: Cannot De-activate Web Connect in QM2017
looking for feedback multiple times with no follow-up. Please clarify. 

I just commented in the forum post associated with the 1st link.   I'll try to get this fixed in 4.6. 

Quicken Marcus

smayer97 (QM2007, CDN user since '92) said:

@Quicken Marcus if you have not seen this, I recommend you read the following discussion thread:
QMac 2017: Apparently No Option for Variable Interest Rates under new Quicken Mac Version 4.5.0

We do not currently support variable rate loans in 4.5.  We have designs for it and continue to work on the loan feature but I feel uncomfortable providing a specific date or version  number since things are still in flux.

Quicken Marcus

km-nm said:

In 4.5.2, I had converted my mortgage liability account to a Loan.  Then I went to set up automatic download, and I was surprised that I couldn't link my Loan account.  My only options were Ignore or set up a new account.  So I just cancelled out.  Eventually, I realized that I could use the Edit Loan and Payment Terms screen to change the Loan Type to "Mortgage".  Once I did this, I was able to set up Automatic Download again, and this time my Mortgage (not Loan) account was offered for linking.

I think it would be nice if non-downloaded Loan accounts were also offered for linking, and if the link is established, then the Loan Type could be changed to Mortgage (or whatever is appropriate) automatically.

km-nm, I wasn't able to reproduce the issue you're seeing.  Let me describe what I tested.  I created a manual liability account.  Added about 15 transactions.  I converted the liability to a loan and then closed the settings sheet.  I then I clicked on the + button and selected Loan > auto.  Entered in my information for my auto loan.  Got a screen that allowed me to link to 3 accounts including the converted liability account.  I clicked on my liability account and linked it.  From your description, it sounds like that was not an option for you.  Did any of the steps you took differ from what I did?

Snoopy FC

Snoopy FC said:

OK.  I now have QM2017 4.5.2, and I just converted my mortgage from a liability account to a new loan account.  The loan account appears to be setup correctly and has added the scheduled transaction.  

However, on the loan payment setup, I cannot pick the category that I have set up to track mortgage spending in my budget.  It's setup only to do a transfer to the loan account from the bank account.  Of course budgets aren't currently able to track transfers.  Now I have a problem.  The shot below shows the principal and extra principal with no options to pick a category.  


That leads to this screen clearly indicating a transfer only has been setup: 

Notice the principal is only setup as a transfer reminder and remember how we can't budget transfers.  So now what do I do to track mortgage spending in my budget?  

Suggestions: 
1. Add transfers to budgets so that I can see this money being spent on the mortgage principal
2. Allow us to set the category for mortgage principal and setup monthly principal reductions in the mortgage (loan) account

Any workaround ideas anyone?
 

In case anyone is interested, the simplest workaround I've found so far is not setting up a bill reminder from the loan account.  Just using the mortgage reminder split that I already had.  Not sure how this will work once the next payment applies, but we'll see.  I'm wondering if the mortgage account will auto update or if I'll need to manually adjust principal and interest.  I suspect the latter.  

I'd rather use the bill reminders setup through the mortgage account, but for the reasons I listed above, that doesn't appear possible yet.  

Unknown

km-nm said:

In 4.5.2, I had converted my mortgage liability account to a Loan.  Then I went to set up automatic download, and I was surprised that I couldn't link my Loan account.  My only options were Ignore or set up a new account.  So I just cancelled out.  Eventually, I realized that I could use the Edit Loan and Payment Terms screen to change the Loan Type to "Mortgage".  Once I did this, I was able to set up Automatic Download again, and this time my Mortgage (not Loan) account was offered for linking.

I think it would be nice if non-downloaded Loan accounts were also offered for linking, and if the link is established, then the Loan Type could be changed to Mortgage (or whatever is appropriate) automatically.

Marcus, Do you mean the + button that's in the middle of the 3 buttons by Accounts in the top left?  If so, that's not how I did it.  Instead, I right-clicked on my existing account in the accounts list on the left and chose "Edit 'Nationstar Mortgage' Settings...".  On the resulting dialog, I chose "Set up transaction download".  So I was working from within the existing account.

Unknown

Thomas said:

I was working with budgeting today and really strange behavior. I have what is normally expenses showing up in my Income Field. This is on the 1 month view. This is very bizarre behavior.

Marcus, I deleted the budget and created a new one. The results are different but still very odd. I create a budget starting 01/2017, in the 1 month view I now two legitamite income categories. I click on the right arrow to go to February and one of the categories changes to an expense, I click again into march and now this category turns into a different expense....and it continues on that way.

Quicken Marcus

Thomas said:

I am using 4.5.1 Prior to this I could select a Web Connect Account and type Command U and I would be taken to the financial site to download the Web Connect file. It is now greyed out and cannot use the command.

I decided to revert disabling the Update Selected Online Account menu.  It just isn't worth changing at this point because of the workflow issues that change was causing.  Thanks for bringing it up here in the forums before that change made it out to everyone.

Quicken Marcus

Thomas said:

When I updated to 4.5.1 I immediately started to use the new loan feature. I ran into some major problems where i could no longer launch the application until i used a backup of my current Quicken file. I assume it became corrupt and caused the crash. Once i started fresh I was able to repeat my steps and continue. I did run into an issue where i could only use “Years” for loan length. When ever I would try another unit no matter how many months it would force the loan to be paid off in 1 year. ie i selected 120 months which should have been 10 years. It would set up payments such that it would be paid off in 1 year. I had to select 10 years in order for the payments to actually be displayed as 10 years. This was with a loan type “Loan”. I also tried 120 payments but with same results.

Because of the issues people have reported, I've asked for our test team to do another pass on loans and for us to fix everything we find before we start the roll out again.  We won't release again until all of that has completed.  

Quicken Marcus

Snoopy FC said:

OK.  I now have QM2017 4.5.2, and I just converted my mortgage from a liability account to a new loan account.  The loan account appears to be setup correctly and has added the scheduled transaction.  

However, on the loan payment setup, I cannot pick the category that I have set up to track mortgage spending in my budget.  It's setup only to do a transfer to the loan account from the bank account.  Of course budgets aren't currently able to track transfers.  Now I have a problem.  The shot below shows the principal and extra principal with no options to pick a category.  


That leads to this screen clearly indicating a transfer only has been setup: 

Notice the principal is only setup as a transfer reminder and remember how we can't budget transfers.  So now what do I do to track mortgage spending in my budget?  

Suggestions: 
1. Add transfers to budgets so that I can see this money being spent on the mortgage principal
2. Allow us to set the category for mortgage principal and setup monthly principal reductions in the mortgage (loan) account

Any workaround ideas anyone?
 

Sorry, I'm replying so late.  You're exactly right.  That should work and its a bug.  The better workaround is to switch to the bill reminder tab in Loan Details and then click OK.  This should update the scheduled transaction.  The way this works is similar to Quicken Windows where the upcoming scheduled transaction reflects the principal and interest for the upcoming payment.  So for example, if you've just set up loans,  the scheduled transaction model reflects the splits for the June payment.  Once you mark this as Paid, we update the scheduled transaction to reflect the Principal and Interest split for the July payment.  The split will change after each month automatically after you mark a scheduled transaction as paid. I hope that makes sense.  

Quicken Marcus

Henryth said:

No problems so far, but I'm not using many fancy features. Only issue I discovered is that the back-up file from issue 4.5.2 can not be opened by issue 4.4.3. Thus I can not transfer files from one Mac to another.

Yes, once you upgrade to 4.5 you can't go back.  This is because we've made a number of changes in the file for loans which 4.4.3 doesn't recognize or understand.  As RickO says you can use a USB drive or something else to transfer Quicken to the other computer.  Of course, once we upgrade everyone, you can just take the update on the other machine.

Snoopy FC

Thomas said:

When I updated to 4.5.1 I immediately started to use the new loan feature. I ran into some major problems where i could no longer launch the application until i used a backup of my current Quicken file. I assume it became corrupt and caused the crash. Once i started fresh I was able to repeat my steps and continue. I did run into an issue where i could only use “Years” for loan length. When ever I would try another unit no matter how many months it would force the loan to be paid off in 1 year. ie i selected 120 months which should have been 10 years. It would set up payments such that it would be paid off in 1 year. I had to select 10 years in order for the payments to actually be displayed as 10 years. This was with a loan type “Loan”. I also tried 120 payments but with same results.

Appreciate the delay and the explanation.  

Snoopy FC

Snoopy FC said:

OK.  I now have QM2017 4.5.2, and I just converted my mortgage from a liability account to a new loan account.  The loan account appears to be setup correctly and has added the scheduled transaction.  

However, on the loan payment setup, I cannot pick the category that I have set up to track mortgage spending in my budget.  It's setup only to do a transfer to the loan account from the bank account.  Of course budgets aren't currently able to track transfers.  Now I have a problem.  The shot below shows the principal and extra principal with no options to pick a category.  


That leads to this screen clearly indicating a transfer only has been setup: 

Notice the principal is only setup as a transfer reminder and remember how we can't budget transfers.  So now what do I do to track mortgage spending in my budget?  

Suggestions: 
1. Add transfers to budgets so that I can see this money being spent on the mortgage principal
2. Allow us to set the category for mortgage principal and setup monthly principal reductions in the mortgage (loan) account

Any workaround ideas anyone?
 

Marcus, I think it does, but the bigger issue for me is tracking the mortgage balance in my budget.  Right now the scheduled transaction feature in the loan setup doesn't facilitate that. 

Given the current inability to track either transfers in the budget or use my own category for the mortgage (principal payments), the current loan payment setup doesn't work well for me as I noted above.    

RickO

Thomas said:

I am using 4.5.1 Prior to this I could select a Web Connect Account and type Command U and I would be taken to the financial site to download the Web Connect file. It is now greyed out and cannot use the command.

By this you mean it's going back to the way it was in 4.4.x? (That would be good for now.)