QWin 2017: misssing _401Contrib Category
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Didn't work. I backed up, deleted paycheck reminder, copied, validated, then recreated a new paycheck with a different name, which included a xfer to a 401k account, Entered a pay transaction into register. _401contrib entries still missing. Last 401contrib entry as before - 1/21/17Ralph Knox said:I have the problem where _401Contrib is no longer showing up as an offset to my gross income. It disappeared from Quicken 2017 last year when I started a new job and created a new detailed version PayCheck entry.
I first noticed this when I imported tax info into TurboTax - normally W2 would populate correctly by accounting for 401k contributions. Then I went into Tax Center (both in the Tax Planner and Taxable Income YTD) and verified that no negative offset _401Contrib transactions are being recorded.
Another way I can verify this is going to transaction list, scrolling down to the _401Contrib line item. It shows 472 count in the usage column. If I click on this number and hit recategorize, I will get a table report of all the 472 _401Contrib entries - all of my 401k entries over the years. The last one is for 1/21/17 which was the last paycheck entry for my old company entry. None of the entries for my new job are showing up.
I have changed nothing else - paychecks have a pretax xfer to a 401k account. I tried deleting and recreating the 401k account. I tried recreating the paycheck entry. The problem remains. I have also ran validate checks on my data file - no issues reported. And just to be really clear, it matters not whether I hide or unhide the _401Contrib entry in the Transaction list. Something is broken.
I saw in another closed post from 4 years ago that there have been reports of spouse income entries getting screwed up and/or possibly screwing up the my income entries. I do also track spouse income, though no 401k -- might be related somehow... ?
Interested in ideas on how to resolve.0 -
Returning to this thread. I would really like to be able to setup a paycheck that correctly represents my 401(k) contributions. As described above the _401contrib category does not get setup properly. This has not worked for me since setting up a new paycheck a couple years ago (i.e. I changed jobs, deleted the old paycheck and created a new one). Any new insights here? Is there a Quicken support process to address ongoing unresolved problems??0
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Anyone?0
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Sherlock, you were last person offering advice on this missing _401contrib problem. I am revisiting the problem - it's still there - and I am reluctant to upgrade from Quicken 2017 knowing it will almost certainly still exist on a newer version of Quicken.
I was able to go back to a backup made in January of 2017. This was my data file prior to upgrading to Quicken 2017 (which I did in April 2017). I was previously on Quicken 2016, so the referenced backup is a 2016 file. I opened it in Quicken 2017, at which point I had to login with a new Cloud account (in itself a headache, but I worked through that). Once I had access to my data file, I was able to successfully create a new 401k account and a new paycheck and verified that the _401contrib entry was working (I had first tried an April 2017 backup, which exhibited the problem at it exists currently).
So, per your advice, I have identified a backup prior to my current problem where the _401contrib entry is working properly. So what are my options at this point? Starting from this file and trying to move to present date seems like a daunting task - not even sure if it is possible. Is there some way of importing my recent data into the older backup? Is there any proven process for dealing with this type of situation? Wouldn't it be nice if there was a tool where you could go into your current file, display things, and fix your problem … Thoughts?
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@Ralph Knox - I did some more testing with a simple test file I maintain to try and help you work around this. Each of the steps below worked in that file. First, restoring from the backup is a sure thing although very tedious. For moving transactions from one file to another, search for QIF transfers on this forum and the Quicken support site for info on how to do those.
Workaround- Do this on a Copy of your file in case it goes badly.
1. Your data file has a corrupt link to that hidden Tax Impact account. This account normally gets created the first time you create a 401k account in your data file. I found a way to get Quicken to create a new Tax Impact account but it requires deleting the old Tax Impact account. The problem (one of them) is trying to preserve all the old entries in that account and get them into the new account. These entries are recorded by a hidden operation in the Tax Impact account when the Paycheck entry is Entered into the register.
2. The easiest way to access the Tax Impact account is to use Edit>Find/Replace. Search for Cleared Status contains Uncleared. Look for the Tax Impact account. Clicking on the Date link gets you to the account register. Use Move Transactions (right-click on register entry) to move all existing transactions into a new manual 401k account you create to temporarily hold them.
3. Using the gear icon to access Account Details in the now empty Tax Impact account, delete the account. I tried just Closing it but that does not work.
4. Create another new manual entry 401k account. Creating a new account will create a new Tax Impact account.
5. Create a Paycheck reminder for a test company (or your real paycheck) to deposit a 401k employee contribution into the 401k in Step 4. Enter the Paycheck into your checking account.
6. Use Find/Replace to verify the new Tax Impact hidden account has been created and the entry recorded in the register.
7. Move all of the transactions from the old Tax Impact in the Temp 401k into the new Tax Impact account (reverse Step 2).
8. Cleanup the mess by deleting the temp accounts not needed and figure out how to handle all of your paycheck entries during the non-working period of the account (you might have to re-enter them all to get them to show up in the Tax Impact account, but if your lucky maybe a simple edit/save of the paycheck in your checking account might make that entry to Tax Impact). You could also just manually enter the transactions in the new Tax Impact account as was previously suggested.
Good Luck. If you try it, let me know how it works out.
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Markus, Thanks for this - will give it a try. From original Sherlock discussion, I have been able to locate the Tax Impact account. There are a couple things I am not sure about though:
1. All the entries (I have about 140 of them) in the Tax Impact account reference a single 401k account -- my Dell 401k account - true even for entries that are actually associated with another 401k account. Is this right? Maybe it is just the shaded out entry? (see attached sample from my Tax Impact account) However, I cannot modify that field either with an existing entry, or when I try to create a new entry. .
2. When I try to create a new Tax Impact entry (in anticipation of doing your workflow), I am not able to specify recording back onto the Tax Impact account in the Transfer account field, as Tax Impact is not a field in the popup list, nor can I manually enter it.
All of this really asks: what is the correct transaction that needs to be created in the Tax Impact account? I believe they must be created in this account, as no "explicit" entry for _401kcontrib exists in my checking or 401k account (in these accounts it is instead a standard transfer from checking entry to 401k entry). Hope this makes sense.
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As to #1, no worries about that account name. It appears no matter how many 401k's are in the file, there is only 1 tax impact account.
As to # 2, I see that now. So editing the existing entries appears to be the only way to get the missing interim entries into the Tax Impact account. I found a quirk to that though which will complicate things. Editing an existing entry will only work for a 401k created at the time of or after the first new 401k that creates the working Tax Impact account.
So you will need to figure that out. My suggestion would be to Move all of your current employer 401k transactions into the new 401k you create to restore the Tax Impact account. A quick test showed the move worked but entries did not automatically flow to Tax Impact. But, when I simply went to the checking account and opened the paycheck entry and re-entered it, the Tax Impact account was populated.
Before moving the current employer transactions, I would deactivate it from downloads if you use that and then activate the new account for downloads after it is set up properly.
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Okay, makes sense. Current employer is new (only an entry or two), but previous employer is missing the _401contributions, so I should be able to recreate a 401k account for previous employer.
So far so good, but I am stuck at moving transactions out of the Tax Impact account. I don't think what you suggested will work (right click, move), as it is an investment account and cut/paste, move/copy transactions are limited in such accounts. Further, because Tax Impact is hidden, seems you can't export to .qif either. Were you able to accomplish a multiple transaction move from Tax Impact? I have over 400 Tax Impact transactions, so this could be a show stopper ...
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It's possible QW19 has different options for investment account transaction Moves, but I thought that feature had been around for a while. In QW19, the right-click Move brings up a window that allows selecting all transactions in the account.0
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Hmm, maybe I'll see if I can make it work with a few historical transactions before I plunge into 2019. Investment register operations have always been lacking, so sounds like a step forward. Are there any big file conversions that take place from 17 to (18) to 19? It seems your testing around the _401contribution issue is otherwise consistent with previous versions of Quicken.0
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Online Billers was the last change of database structure. QW17 thru 19 can be used interchangeabley.0
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It seems I can't even move a single investment transaction from one account to another: [url removed]
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That is not quicken support . Likely a scam site0
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Ah, sorry about that. Looked real - trying to be in the Quicken support business I guess.
So, in Quicken 2017 I can copy/paste an investment transaction from/to regular investment accounts, but not from the Tax Impact account. That you can do that at all in 2019 is significant. Unless there is some other way that I am not seeing.
With a test copy, I tried deleting the Tax Impact Account (along with all the entries) and recreating a 401k account and paycheck reminder. This did work - I have some additional questions - will go back and review my steps. One thing that stood out was that in the new Tax Impact account, the category transfer entry was NOT a transfer back on the same account (the way my previous Tax Impact entries were) but rather a transfer from Checking. Did you see the same? It may be a newer implementation of the 401K shadowing - probably doesn't matter otherwise … ?
In any case, it would seem that if I am going to attempt this rebuilding, I will need to first move to 2019.
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The Tax Impact account register entry in QW19 after deleting and re-creating the account looks just like your screen shot above. No change in the before and after other than the "source" account shown "greyed out" changed in the new account (Dell in your shot).0
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> @markus1957 said:
> As to # 2, I see that now. So editing the existing entries appears to be the only way to get the missing interim entries into the Tax Impact account. I found a quirk to that though which will complicate things. Editing an existing entry will only work for a 401k created at the time of or after the first new 401k that creates the working Tax Impact account.
Markus, in reviewing the steps I would need to take, this "quirk" concerns me. The first new 401k that creates the Tax Impact account will be the newest account. Therefore older missing entries from existing transactions will be older by definition. How do you work around that? Or are you saying that those older 401k accounts with the missing entries to Tax Impact would have to be deleted and recreated? Can you clarify?0 -
Markus, in reviewing the steps I would need to take, this "quirk" concerns me. The first new 401k that creates the Tax Impact account will be the newest account. Therefore older missing entries from existing transactions will be older by definition. How do you work around that? - When you perform the Moves to the temp account and back to the new Tax Impact account, the dates will populate in date sequence; that should not be an issue.
Or are you saying that those older 401k accounts with the missing entries to Tax Impact would have to be deleted and recreated? - After the Move you should only have the missing entries from the old employer to deal with. They will have to be re-created by editing the existing paycheck entries for the missing entries. Or you can just enter them in the Tax Impact account manually.
Can you clarify?
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Still concerned that I will be able to edit those old employer transactions, as they will be older than the 401k account which creates the Tax Impact account, If, what you are saying here: "Editing an existing entry will only work for a 401k created at the time of or after the first new 401k that creates the working Tax Impact account." is true.0
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How many missing old employer entries are we talking about in the Tax Impact register?
I know you said you had about 400 total in the register but those should copy over easily into the new Tax Impact register. The remainder will just have to be entered manually; I don't see a way around that short of recreating the former employer account from scratch. Given that for most people the 401k contributions are the same amounts, copy/paste with the correct dates might be a quicker manual option.
What I did not test was creating a new former employer 401k, moving the register entries and then editing each paycheck entry to create the Tax Impact entry. That will require clicking through each paycheck entry to cover your 400 current entries and the missing entries. In this case you would not Move any of the Tax Impact entries from the old employer because they should get recreated by reentering each paycheck.
You should be doing this on a copy so you can always revert back to your current data file. My sense is manually entering the missing entries will be quicker. If you go forward let me know how it turns out.
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I have purchased 2019 - stay tuned. Need to proceed cautiously - don't understand if I can keep my bank bill pay or whether I need to sign up for Quicken Bill Pay, and cancel existing. Or whether I have some time to make that transition. Or whether bank bill pay and Quicken Bill Pay are mutually exclusive. Not a friendly product.0
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You do not need to use Quicken BillPay.0
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Quicken 2019 installed. Thanks for note about BillPay - I am using bank pay as I did in previous versions. So I am upgraded and back to normal (okay there were some cloud sync issues, but have resolved those).
Getting ready to try this - here's my concern again. For the "missing" entries (the ones that are not there because of the broken/corrupt link), you stated that I can either edit or enter new. However, we decided a few messages back, that new entries do not get created with the account saved back onto itself. That is, that account showing in the entry is from the source (in my case checking) account. At least this is what I understood you to be saying when you said "as to #2, I see that now". In other words, the only way this will work is re-editing the source entries, hoping that will trigger an entry in Tax Impact acct. However, you also stated the quirk was that this won't work for entries that are older than the 401k account that creates the tax impact account. But "missing" entries "are" older than this newly created 401k account. So, this could make it impossible to fix.
I am going to try it anyway, with a copy of course. Will let you know.0 -
For the former employer account, manually entering (or copy/paste/edit) the missing entries is the most expedient. For the New Employer, once the new 401k is created for the new employer, any entries associated with the new account will get entered whether they are dated before the corruption date or not. It's more a matter of a corrupted account never adding the Tax Impact entries automatically again for a new entry than a particular date.0
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I still think there's a concern the way you have described. But only way is to find out.
So, I was able to xfer the entries from my Tax Impact Acct (TIA) into a temp 401(k). I deleted the TIA, then created a new 401(k) acct. However, a new TIA did not get created. I then even created a new paycheck reminder but still no TIA. I was about to start over but decided to create a 2nd new 401(k) account. This time a new TIA was created. So I should be back on track.
Not sure why it took 2 tries to produce a TIA. The 2nd time, I added some dummy investments during the setup process. Significant? Or, maybe it was because I used a unique name for 401(k) account (instead of a name I had used previously based on Company X). Curious too: did you get this message when deleting the TIA (attached)0 -
Update 2: Moved Old transactions from temp 401(k) account back to TIA, no problem (Xfer/Move/Copy capability much improved in 2019).
Eventually I was able to get a Paycheck entry to create a record in the TIA, but so far only on a PayCheck where the 401(k) account is the same one that created the TIA (in my case this was the 2nd 401(k) account I created, not including the original temp one). Doing this with a 401(k) account created subsequently (after the one that created TIA), so far, will not work. If this is true, has implications for if one ever joins yet another company. Not a showstopper though.
Then, I tried to replace those missing transactions. For me this is a single employer PayCheck, call it Company M (after the last valid entry in TIA, but before my current employer). I tried editing the $ amount in Company M paycheck in my checking account and entering. No joy, nothing gets created in TIA. Then I tried to create a new entry in TIA, first by copying a transaction, then by creating new. Either way, as we have discussed previously, it will not allow a transfer back onto itself (TIA) and hence the new record is not the same (no account listed, $ amount is negative, where others are positive).
So, at this point, this is not looking promising. I could try recreating a paycheck and/or a 401(k) account for Company M to see if it will populate TIA. That would be a fair amount of manual effort, but could be done if it works. My guess is it won't. But I will try that to see.0 -
Update 3: Okay, I have figured it out. Markus, I think in line with what you have been saying. I created new 401(k) account for missing transactions (Company M). I was then able to edit each Company M paycheck and change 401(k) account to new one. When saved, this generated an entry in TIA. I had 30 or so of these to do, but easy enough. Then I transferred the investment purchases selectively from old Company M 401(k) account to new. Finally, I tidied up the current employer 401(k). Not sure why initially I couldn't make it work with a new 401(k) account but in the end it did. Thanks for all you assistance! I will write up a procedure in case I need to do again - will post.1
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Update 4: On a separate copy of my file I tried to repeat, or streamline, the process that successfully fixed the broken _401contrib / Tax Impact Account (TIA) problem above. Unfortunately I encountered a new problem - when I went to edit the paycheck entries, they did not open to show the split entries; they were instead empty. I do not know why this happened this time and not the first time I tried this repair process. Might be related to the warning I attached above at the point of TIA deletion. In any case, I believe the steps should be:
1. Create a copy of Quicken file with problem
2. Create a temporary 401k account and move all the entries from TIA to temporary account
3. Create a new 401k account which will eventually be for your current employer/paycheck/401k. Call it something unique - I believe I ran into issues last time by renaming the existing current 401k account, then creating a new one but with the old name. Don't worry about the unique name - you can rename your 401k account later after all the editing is done.
4. By creating the 401k account, a new TIA will also be created.
5. Move all the entries in the temporary 401k account back to the TIA.
6. Edit all your current Paycheck entries, substituting original 401k entries with new 401k created in step 3.
7. Depending on how recent your current Paycheck series is, you may now be able to download all the purchase entries by setting up the online connection to your 401k provider. If not, you will also need to move the purchase transactions from original 401k account to your new 401k account.
8. Now create a 2nd new 401k account for your previous employer/paycheck/401k which has entries missing for_401contrib in the TIA. Process is essentially the same. Give it a unique name that you can change later.
9. Repeat steps 6 and 7 for this older paycheck series. Note, if you have multiple different employers with missing TIA entries, you will need to repeat steps 8 and 9 for each additional employer.
10. Delete the temporary 401k account, delete any original 401k accounts which you have now replaced above. Rename the new 401k accounts back to something meaningful.
11. If all goes well, the problem is resolved, and each new paycheck entry going forward will generate the correct shadow entries.1
This discussion has been closed.