Does quicken have any accounting controls whatsoever?

brett172

[rant redacted]

The system allows me to enter wrong information with no error check at all, example BOUGHT or BOUGHTX. I dont know where the difference came from, but this [removed] only entered half the transaction. It entered a stock purchase, but did not enter where the money came from.

Tom Young

I assume what happened here - can't really tell and maybe it was in your deleted rant - was that you selected an "Action" of BoughtX and then entered the same investment Account in which you were making the entry as the "bank account" where the funds were coming from.

Quicken is weak here because the accounting entry itself - forgetting the "Action" that was chosen - should have looked like a regular purchase, i.e., an increase in a security and a decrease in cash; in other words it should have looked like a normal purchase with cash supplied out of the investment account.  

But Quicken's programming here dictates a different result.  Namely, the accounting entry - an entry that does follow "double entry" conventions - end us being a debit (increase) in the Investment Account and an offsetting credit (increase) to your net worth.  As far as I know there really isn't a "net worth" Account in Quicken - I'd guess Quicken calculates it on the fly - but it is an entry that most accounting programs allow. That accounting result occurs because you booked a transaction within an Account with the offsetting entry being into the same Account and that bit of programming had precedence over your BoughtX entry.

thecreator

Hi @brett172 ,

See this FAQ:  https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7307115/add-your-quicken-information-to-your-posts-plus-how-you-are-connected-to-the-internet

Did you happen to click Help , then Quicken Help or simply hit F1 on the Keyboard and Enter the Search Term BOUGHTX




It tells you exactly what the terms are.

I would say to buy the program, except if you lack patience to learn it.

Chris Harris

@Brett172, I do recommend that you hang in there. Quicken is not an easy program to learn, but it is quite powerful and its functionality goes far beyond anything else available.

It took me nearly 5 years to feel comfortable with my skills, and I still have a lot to learn, but I'm glad that I stuck it out 

Also, I have seen really decent, positive improvements ever since Intuit sold the company awhile back and they switched to the subscription model. The new company is actively improving Quicken, unlike Intuit, and seem to be making smart, sustainable changes.

Granted, their are still plenty of things I wish they'd work on or functionality I wish it had.  At least now, I feel there's a chance of those things occurring. 

You can learn an awful lot from these Forums.  Also,  it's old school,  but I found it helpful to get "Quicken For Dummies" type books from the libraries; even ones for older versions.  Those really helped get me started. 

UKR

Normally, the process of buying a Security in an Investment Account is a two-step process, not necessarily in that order:

1. You transfer money from a Checking account into your Investment account.
2. You purchase the Security using the Cash Balance in the Investment account.

The difference between using a Bought or BoughtX transaction is, IMHO:

Does a "linked Cash/Checking account" exist for this Investment account?
If yes, Quicken automatically generates a BoughtX transaction to transfer the cash from the linked Cash account.
Otherwise, a Bought transaction takes the cash directly from the Cash / Margin balance of the Investment account.
You can create a BoughtX transaction and specify your Checking account, but you still need to remember to write a check or otherwise transfer funds to cover the purchase. Making it two separate transactions in Quicken, especially if you download transactions from all your banks and brokerages, makes it easier to reconcile your account registers.

Tom Young

I assume what happened here - can't really tell and maybe it was in your deleted rant - was that you selected an "Action" of BoughtX and then entered the same investment Account in which you were making the entry as the "bank account" where the funds were coming from.

Quicken is weak here because the accounting entry itself - forgetting the "Action" that was chosen - should have looked like a regular purchase, i.e., an increase in a security and a decrease in cash; in other words it should have looked like a normal purchase with cash supplied out of the investment account.  

But Quicken's programming here dictates a different result.  Namely, the accounting entry - an entry that does follow "double entry" conventions - end us being a debit (increase) in the Investment Account and an offsetting credit (increase) to your net worth.  As far as I know there really isn't a "net worth" Account in Quicken - I'd guess Quicken calculates it on the fly - but it is an entry that most accounting programs allow. That accounting result occurs because you booked a transaction within an Account with the offsetting entry being into the same Account and that bit of programming had precedence over your BoughtX entry.

brett172

I would like to thank everyone for their help.
I am also a bit curious as to how my "rant" was redacted, because I did not do it.
I was much happier with MS Money but I was using the 2004 version and it did not work well on newer systems. I have been using Quicken and I am pretty disappointed with it. I key in all my entries and I update my stock prices manually. I did allow the system to download stock prices, but never transactions. Now that I do not subscribe I do everything manually.

thecreator

@brett1

brett172 said:

I would like to thank everyone for their help.
I am also a bit curious as to how my "rant" was redacted, because I did not do it.
I was much happier with MS Money but I was using the 2004 version and it did not work well on newer systems. I have been using Quicken and I am pretty disappointed with it. I key in all my entries and I update my stock prices manually. I did allow the system to download stock prices, but never transactions. Now that I do not subscribe I do everything manually.

Hi @brett172 ,

That was done by Quicken Sarah, a Moderator of this board.

See Flag.


Learn the program and maybe you can help others out on this Forum Board.