Two Businesses, one data file.

brandon

I have the Home, Business and Rental Property version of Quicken for Windows.

In the Business section, I have set up two businesses... however when I set up the first it asked me to associate the banking accounts I wanted with that business and this worked... but when I set up the second, it didn't ask this question and I can't seem to associate the desired accounts with this second business.

Any advice?

Frankx

Hi @brandon,

Okay, I understand now that your question is actually about making sure that you get the business costs allocated to the proper business.  The way to do that is to use Tags when you enter checks (and other transactions such as credit card purchases).  There currently should be 2 separate Tags setup in Quicken - one for each of your businesses.  So all you need to do is to make sure that you "Tag" each transaction for one or the other business. Or if one expenditure applies to both businesses, you should use a "split" transaction to allocate that expenditure between each business.

Let me know if you have any followup questions.

Frankx 

Frankx

Hi again @brandon,

There is a way to make changes to Tags en masse (although it may not be as easy as you'd like).  It needs to be done on an account by account basis (e.g. for each checking, credit card, or other Q account at a time).  Here are the steps:

1. Open the account that contains the transaction you need to edit.
2. In the account register, select the transactions you want to change. (hold down on the Ctrl key to select numerous non-contiguous transactions)
3. Right Click on one of the selected transactions and select "Edit transaction(s).
4. At the bottom of the pop-up in the "Replace" box - select "Tag" in the "With" box select the business that you want to reassign the expenditure to;
5. Click on the "Replace All" button.

Before you do the above - make sure that you make a backup of your data file, just in case you have problems.

Good luck!

Frankx

Frankx

HI @brandon,

You probably know that you can add a new bank account to Quicken and - as part of the setup of that account - you can "associate" it to your business.

You can also "associate" an existing bank account with a business by doing the following:

1) Open the account in Quicken;
2) Click on the gear icon in the upper right hand corner and select "Edit account details";
3)Select the "display Options" tab;
4) In the "Account Intent" section - Click on the arrow and change "Personal" to "Business";
5) Click "OK"

If you then go to the "Business" tab in Quicken - you'll see the bank account there.

Let me know if you have any followup questions.

Frankx

brandon

Frankx... yes all my business accounts are set to be 'Business accounts'. Now, in the Business tab in the profit and loss sub-tab there is a place to add "businesses" (not accounts if I am understanding this right) and I have set up two different businesses since I have two. I want the P/L details to show details for these businesses separately. when I created the first Business... it asked me what accounts were relevant for this business... when I set up the second one it didn't prompt this questions. Hence my confusion on how to associate transactions in my business checking/credit accounts with one business or another.

Frankx

Hi @brandon,

Okay, I understand now that your question is actually about making sure that you get the business costs allocated to the proper business.  The way to do that is to use Tags when you enter checks (and other transactions such as credit card purchases).  There currently should be 2 separate Tags setup in Quicken - one for each of your businesses.  So all you need to do is to make sure that you "Tag" each transaction for one or the other business. Or if one expenditure applies to both businesses, you should use a "split" transaction to allocate that expenditure between each business.

Let me know if you have any followup questions.

Frankx 

brandon

Thank you Frankx. This clears some things up.

I am starting with a fresh Quicken file and just moving over (from a mac to a PC) transactions from 2019 - today. I know I can select a bunch of transactions and assign a category to them all at once using the contextual menu... but I don't see a way to do this with tags. I have thousands of transactions and it would be great to do this en masse.

Frankx

Hi again @brandon,

There is a way to make changes to Tags en masse (although it may not be as easy as you'd like).  It needs to be done on an account by account basis (e.g. for each checking, credit card, or other Q account at a time).  Here are the steps:

1. Open the account that contains the transaction you need to edit.
2. In the account register, select the transactions you want to change. (hold down on the Ctrl key to select numerous non-contiguous transactions)
3. Right Click on one of the selected transactions and select "Edit transaction(s).
4. At the bottom of the pop-up in the "Replace" box - select "Tag" in the "With" box select the business that you want to reassign the expenditure to;
5. Click on the "Replace All" button.

Before you do the above - make sure that you make a backup of your data file, just in case you have problems.

Good luck!

Frankx

brandon

That was easy enough, thanks!

Frankx

Happy to help!!