"Specify Lots" when selling mutual fund shares has odd / broken workflow - Known Issue?

Scooterlam

I recently sold 15 mutual fund lots out of my brokerage account and ran across some odd behavior in the "Edit Sell - Shares Sold" dialog > "Specified Lots" feature.  I see there were a few other similar threads.  I did a file validation / rebuild investing lots (no issues), no placeholders or hidden transactions as well.  I am using QW HBR R23.17. 

Lastly, FWIW, the lots that are being sold are shares that were transferred from a now closed brokerage account using "Transfer Shares" action.  As a check, I also tested on lots that were not part of the "transfer shares". That is, shares that were purchased in the NEW brokerage.  Same result.

I'll walk you through it. show you my issue and how I finally got it to work....At least the Capital Gains Report is showing what I expected it to show.   

Tell me if my workflow is the "as designed' intended workflow!  Or maybe a bug or file corruption not caught during validation.  Perhaps a known issue?  Or simply operator error!  Refer to the steps and images below...

In the brokerage account, I click "Edit" and ...

1.  Select Sell - Shares Sold

2.  Select the MF security name

3.  Enter sales price

4.  Press "Specify Lots" button to select the lot and number of shares that were sold.



5.  In the "Specify Lots...." table, I find the lot and enter the number of shares that were sold.  In this case, I type in the same number shown in "Available to Sell".

6.  Press Ok and get the following "error" dialog.   At this point, I expected that the number in "Shares to Sell" would transfer to "Number of Shares", in the previous screen (8).  

7.   Also, I noticed odd figures in the "Total Shares to Sell" and "Remaining to Select"  I expected the "Total Shares to Sell" to be what I entered in Step 5 and "Remaining to Select" = 0.   The negative share count in "Remaining to Select" seems to suggest that I am short selling.  I am not.



I cancel out of all these dialogs in the "Specify Lots...." table and get back to first image (Edit Sell - Shares Sold) dialog.   So....there (5), (6), (7) is the "error"  Mine or Quickens?!

9.  After playing around a bit and now that I know how many exact shares are in that particular lot at Step (5), I entered that share count into "Number of Shares" (9) and....

10.  I again click on "Specified Lots" button.  I need to select a lot!



11.   I find (again) the lot to be sold in the transaction table and now see the share count put in at (9) transfers to "Total Shares to Sell".  This process seems backwards to me....That is, if I am selling lots (lots of them) why is it reasonable to expect I would have already known the Number of MF Shares and date of sale in that lot in Step (8) or again in Step (9)?  Why wouldn't I go the route of Steps (4) and (5) and first specify the lot and share count and transfer that "Shares to Sell" share count to Number of Share in Step (9)?  What am I missing?



12.   So I enter (again) the share count in the "Shares to Sell" and click away from the cell.

13.  Now, I see what I expected to see in Steps (5) and (7)!   Clicking OK no longer throws the error dialog in Step (6) and returns me to "Edit Sell - Shares Sold" dialog.



14.  After entering "shares to sell" (12), I reconfirm the correct number of shares to be sold and "Enter / Done".  The register now shows a "Sold" transaction

Jim_Harman

Had this transaction already been entered in Quicken? I see you are starting with Edit and not with Enter Transactions. Was it something other than Sell when you started?

Usually when entering a sale, before clicking on Specify Lots you know how many shares you are selling. It sounds like your situation is somewhat unusual in that you wanted to sell all of a particular lot but did not know how many shares that was. In your case Quicken enters the Specify Lots dialog thinking you want to sell 0 shares.

Also is usually best to enter the total proceeds and commission and let Quicken calculate the share price. 

.

Sherlock

Normally, we know how many shares we've sold when we enter the transaction in Quicken and ww will select the lots in various ways to impact the gain/loss associated with the transaction.  There are a variety of ways to view lots prior to entering the transaction (for example, open the account, select Holdings and the  before the security).  There is also a Capital Gains Estimator tool we may use to plan sales: press Ctrl + U and select Tools > Capital Gains Estimator

Scooterlam

Yes, I knew the details of the lots sold. These were new transactions.

I think my process error was trying to enter each lot separately rather than the total share count and then selecting the individually sold lots until there were no remaining shares to sell. A lot easier.  Lesson learned.

So I deleted the individual lot "sales" (entered last night) and entered a sale with the total share count and proceeded to select the actual lots sold.   At the end, I still had a tiny fractional share left over which I am not sure how to resolve.  The "Total Shares to Sell" figure is correct.  See image.  Perhaps at this point I'll have to figure out how to dispose of the tiny fraction of shares without affecting the sale details or existing portfolio.    Perhaps this fractional share is too small to matter.  

I do see that share counts reported in Quicken often extend 6 places to the right of the decimal, whereas the FI reported share count to only 4 places to the right of the decimal.   I've always downloaded transactions directly from the FI into my investment registers and am not sure how I managed to earn that extra precision from Quicken.  Any course corrections I can make in how I manage/accept downloaded transactions to avoid this?  Perhaps there is a legacy issue that is not worth correcting.

Thanks for your insights!

Jim_Harman

Quicken thinks the sum of the lots you want to sell is 709.225981 but you told it in the main Sell dialog that you want to sell 709.225 shares. I think if you change the number of shares to sell in the main Sell dialog to 709.225981 all will be OK. 

mshiggins

@Scooterlam  
What FI is downloading share purchases to 6 digits? And were there any share class conversions or splits that would have impacted the share quantities?

Jim_Harman

Computershare tracks to 6 decimal places but I don't think they download. It is a real pain to enter manually!

mshiggins

@Jim_Harman I've used memorized investment transactions or QIF import for loading transactions to manual investment accounts. Have you considered either of those methods? 

I find memorized investment transactions better better if you have only a few transactions per month and QIF better if you have many transactions per month. 

Scooterlam

mshiggins said:

@Scooterlam  
What FI is downloading share purchases to 6 digits? And were there any share class conversions or splits that would have impacted the share quantities?

My FI (Fidelity) reports to 4 places.   Quicken was reporting to 6 places for some reason.  Yes, these shares (mostly dividends and LTCG distributions reinvestments) were moved from an old brokerage to Fidelity.  Then, in the new brokerage firm (Fidelity), I did a share class conversion to reduce ER costs. 

q_lurker

Scooterlam said:

mshiggins said:

@Scooterlam  
What FI is downloading share purchases to 6 digits? And were there any share class conversions or splits that would have impacted the share quantities?

 ... I did a share class conversion to reduce ER costs. 

That is likely where the 6-decimal precision came from. I typically follow up those types of events by editing the generated transactions to my desired precision (3). 

mshiggins

I have both a brokerage and a 401(k) with Fidelity. Both accounts report shares to 3 decimal places. 

Scooterlam

mshiggins said:

I have both a brokerage and a 401(k) with Fidelity. Both accounts report shares to 3 decimal places. 

I see that as well. My error.  I saw the order from Fidelity had 4 digits but the 4th was always 0!