Bill and Income Reminders - how to delete?

JCLaramie148

I have over 200 reminders that were introduced to my Quicken Starter software when I installed the program. How can I delete all of these reminders at one time rather than deleting them one at a time? Deleting one Reminder takes about 2 minutes, with over 200 reminders the deletion process will take over 8 hours.

GeoffG

There is no global delete option. You can only delete one by one, but the real question is why it takes 2 minutes to delete a reminder. This is not normal as it should be near instantaneous. You may want to backup your file and run a file validate to ensure data integrity.

GeoffG

I would suggest breaking this task down into a number of "maintenance sessions". Perhaps 20 minutes of deletes at a time and then quit for the day, then try again the next day or so. Eventually, the response time should get much better.

UKR

JCLaramie148 said:

I have over 200 reminders that were introduced to my Quicken Starter software when I installed the program. ...

"Over 200 reminders"? How many? 200, 2000, 20000, more?
A few years ago, a "run away reminder" bug tended to create thousands of reminders in the data file, until Quicken ran out of file space and crashed.

The only remedy then was to restore the Quicken data file from a backup taken prior the problem occurring. That would be my suggestion to solve your problem.

When installing Q 2019 Starter Edition, were you downgrading from an older version of Quicken Deluxe (or higher edition level)? If so, what older Quicken version?

GeoffG

There is no global delete option. You can only delete one by one, but the real question is why it takes 2 minutes to delete a reminder. This is not normal as it should be near instantaneous. You may want to backup your file and run a file validate to ensure data integrity.

JCLaramie148

I was informed by Quicken support the extensive wait period of 2 minutes is caused by the extreme number of Reminders that are clogging the system. Also, for example, the experienced wait time for entering a single transaction is 90 seconds, also caused by the Reminder issue.

GeoffG

I would suggest breaking this task down into a number of "maintenance sessions". Perhaps 20 minutes of deletes at a time and then quit for the day, then try again the next day or so. Eventually, the response time should get much better.

UKR

JCLaramie148 said:

I have over 200 reminders that were introduced to my Quicken Starter software when I installed the program. ...

"Over 200 reminders"? How many? 200, 2000, 20000, more?
A few years ago, a "run away reminder" bug tended to create thousands of reminders in the data file, until Quicken ran out of file space and crashed.

The only remedy then was to restore the Quicken data file from a backup taken prior the problem occurring. That would be my suggestion to solve your problem.

When installing Q 2019 Starter Edition, were you downgrading from an older version of Quicken Deluxe (or higher edition level)? If so, what older Quicken version?

JCLaramie148

Thanks to GeoffG and UKR for your responses. Here's the entire story:
I've been a Quicken user since the early 90s and made several upgrades along the way. A couple years back I upgraded to 2016 Quicken Deluxe (I actually had to go thru a couple free upgrades to get to a version that would allow me to purchase the 2016 Deluxe version).
The 2016 version introduced me to the "Bill and Income Reminders" function which immediately produced the large number of Reminders. The Amount Due for each of these reminders contained so many commas that it was impossible to comprehend the magnitude of the amount. Consequently, the response time for all actions was annoyingly long, i.e. over 2 minutes to boot the program, and 90+ seconds to enter a transaction. Reconciling an account was a real nightmare until I discovered the global method.
I recently upgraded to 2019 Starter version hoping to resolve the response time. Unfortunately, no luck.

UKR

Well, using Q 2016, your data table containing Reminders got clobbered.
At that point in time, a file restore to a correct data file without the broken reminders would have easily fixed the problem.
Now, after many months of suffering it may be too late to fix unless ... using Q 2019 have you tried to run the full file validation procedure as described here?

Troubleshooting 101 - Fixing Software Installation and Data File Problems

Actually, do everything, parts 1 and 2 of the above.
If that doesn't remove the bad reminders, you may have no option but to start over with a fresh new data file as of 1/1/19

Ps56k2

JCLaramie148 said:
The 2016 version introduced me to the "Bill and Income Reminders" function which immediately produced the large number of Reminders.

Well - unfortunately, THAT was when the problem was somehow created, and should have been corrected.  I've also been using Quicken for a long time, and have never seen the Reminders go crazy and somehow auto-create large number of entries.

JCLaramie148

Many thanks to GeoffG, UKR, and ps56k for responding to my "Reminder issue" and suggesting solutions. Following your suggestions the cause of my issue became clear. I was able to delete all Reminders in less than 2 hours - using "maintenance sessions" (thanks GeoffG). The result: boot time is now less than 10 seconds, and transaction time is instantaneous. Life is good!