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How do I enter year end w-2 information

horseylady45

How do I enter year end W-2 info? Have entered paychecks as net each month because I manually entered all information for last year.

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Boatnmaniac

I'd enter a manual transaction with a split category.

Use 12/31/2019 for the date of the transaction.
The first category in the split would be your total gross income for the year less the total net income that was previously entered.
Then enter categories for each of your tax deductions and tax exempt/deductable payroll deductions. Enter the annual amounts deducted from your paychecks for each of those making sure to select the correct tax related categories for each.
If you had other non-tax related deductions taken out of your paychecks (i.e., life insurance, employee stock purchase plan, non-retirement/healthcare savings plan, etc.), they will not be included in your W2 form. You'll need to obtain that information from your last paycheck stub for 2019. Enter categories for the total 2019 amounts for each of those.

You'll know you entered all the information correctly if the total of all the split category transaction is $0.00. If it is something other than that you'll need to review all the split category transactions to find out what you missed or entered incorrectly.

You can enter this transaction in one of two ways:

In your checking account: This is where I would do it. If done correctly the total transaction amount would be $0.00 so it will not affect your checking account balance.
Create a new cash account specifically for this purpose.

UKR

I recommend you set up a Paycheck Reminder to record each of the paychecks you have already received this year and all future paychecks, showing gross income and all the deductions and transfers. Once set up, using this reminder makes entering paychecks simple, even if the amount varies a little for each paycheck.
At the end of the year, the numbers you recorded for each paycheck should match your W-2, meaning that you're one step closer to filing your taxes.

To set up a paycheck reminder select Tools / Manage Bill and Income Reminders.
Click "Add" in the Menu line, then click Income Reminder.
When you see this dialog click the blue text Paycheck Setup Wizard.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6031128/uploads/editor/au/zpc6zxr0rl5p.png

Fill out the Paycheck form with all the details about your paycheck.

All comments

Boatnmaniac

I'd enter a manual transaction with a split category.

Use 12/31/2019 for the date of the transaction.
The first category in the split would be your total gross income for the year less the total net income that was previously entered.
Then enter categories for each of your tax deductions and tax exempt/deductable payroll deductions. Enter the annual amounts deducted from your paychecks for each of those making sure to select the correct tax related categories for each.
If you had other non-tax related deductions taken out of your paychecks (i.e., life insurance, employee stock purchase plan, non-retirement/healthcare savings plan, etc.), they will not be included in your W2 form. You'll need to obtain that information from your last paycheck stub for 2019. Enter categories for the total 2019 amounts for each of those.

You can enter this transaction in one of two ways:

In your checking account: This is where I would do it. If done correctly the total transaction amount would be $0.00 so it will not affect your checking account balance.
Create a new cash account specifically for this purpose.

UKR

Fill out the Paycheck form with all the details about your paycheck.

Boatnmaniac

horseylady45,

Sorry, but I failed to mention one thing. In order for Quicken to properly calculate your Tax Summary and Tax Schedule reports and include them in Tax Planner you'll need to do one other thing: Change the category "Net Pay" to "Gross Pay" for all "Net Pay" transactions previously entered into Quicken for 2019.

You can do that manually for each individual pay transaction or you can do a mass change.

There are a couple of different ways to do a mass change but the way I prefer is to pull up a Banking - Transactions report and customize it:

Select "Yearly"
Select "2019"
Select "All" on the Accounts tab
On the Categories tab, select "Clear All" and then select "Net Pay"
On the Payees tab, select "Clear All" and then select your employer's name
Click on "Show Report"

On the report that comes up:

Review the report to ensure that it includes all of the transactions you want changed and does not include any transactions you do not want changed
Click on the first transaction at the top of the report.
Scroll down to the bottom of the report.
Hold down the Shift key and then click on the last transaction in the report. This will highlight all of the transactions in the report.
Right click on the report and select "Recategorize Transactions".
Enter "Gross Pay" into the popup category field.
Click "OK".

Quicken will now update the category in your register(s) for all the selected transactions and Tax Summary and Tax Schedule reports and Tax Planner will now accurately include them.

horseylady45

Thank you so much for your help.....I am trying to get entered properly and not quite there yet

Boatnmaniac

Glad to hear my suggestions are helping.

If you haven't already done it, do yourself a favor by setting up a Paycheck Reminder as suggested by UKR, too. That will help you a lot for 2020 so you don't need to go through this next year. Even if the amounts vary some from paycheck-to-paycheck, you can always manually edit the split categories of each reminder as your paychecks are deposited to match what was actually paid and deducted. It will make your 2020 tax planning and reporting so much easier.

horseylady45

I will do that......however, I am still having a problem with this....this is probably a very stupid question but I do not find a place in Quicken that I can make a regular double entry posting....ie: I created a new account called w-2 and looked to enter a split transaction but it does not allow me to debit and credit....all my entries just add up to one amount and I can't figure out how to get to the 0 you projected. Also, when I change my net pay to gross pay do I create a new category? There is not one already in Quicken. In regular accounting programs including Quickbooks there is a choice for a general journal entry........am I making this harder than I need to? Thanks again......looking forward to hearing from you. horseylady

Boatnmaniac

I’m a firm believer in there being no such thing as a stupid question but it can be stupid to not ask one.

Regarding the category for Gross Pay: There should already be a default entry for this but it might be called Salary or something else. I've modified my category list so much that I don't recall what that default is. The best thing is to pull up Category List (under Tools) and then click on Personal Income on the left so only the income categories are shown. Then sort it by clicking 2 times on the Tax Line Item column header so all the tax line categories show up at the top of the list. Review the W2 tax line item categories and use the appropriate one. If you don't like how that category is named (i.e., Salary), you can edit it to change its name (i.e., Gross Pay) by clicking on the category to highlight that line and then clicking on the button in the Action column on the right. You can create a brand new category for this if you wish but that is a little more involved and it really provides no benefit over simply using the default category.

Also, for all of your tax deferred/deductible paycheck deductions, be sure to use the appropriate W2 categories. To see what the default categories are for these, instead of clicking on Personal Income (on the left side of the Category List), click on Personal Expenses and Investments. This will ensure that your Tax Schedule and Tax Summary reports and Tax Planner capture that data appropriately.

Regarding the split category entries:

Enter “0” in the Credit entry field for the total transaction amount.
Then in the split category popup: Make Gross Pay your first entry and enter a positive dollar amount. Then for the payroll deduction entries, enter them as negative dollar amounts.

Since you created a new account just for your W2, here is another option you might want to consider: Instead of doing a single split category transaction you could do multiple transactions in the account register, one for each debit and credit and each with the same 2019 transaction date. When you’ve accurately made all your entries the ending balance in the account register will show $0.00. The main advantage of doing it this way is that you can then see each of the transactions directly from the account register without needing to take the additional step of also clicking on the split category. You might also find it a little bit easier to make any edits to fix any errors you might find. In addition, in some reports (where the data is not filtered by category) the details of each of those transactions will show up individually instead of showing as a single split transaction of $0.00. In the end, entering this way or via a single split category transaction is just a matter of personal preference.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

horseylady45

Thank you so much.......I have never encountered a simple program that is so difficult to navigate......I'll work on options and see if I can finally get this right so I'm done with it.

Boatnmaniac

Great. Like anything new software, it's only difficult to navigate until you become familiar with it. The more you use it the easier it gets. Maybe I'm making it sound more difficult than it is because I get too wordy sometimes and I also tend to lay out options instead of just sticking to a single solution. Sorry about that.