Allow a category for split balance

pheller

When creating a paycheck as a split transaction in order to track tax withholdings and other deductions, one creates splits for earnings (Gross Pay, Bonus Pay, etc) and for deductions (Medical, Dental, Federal Tax, Social Security, etc).

The balance of the split transaction is the Net Pay, though there is no way to categorize it as such.

Instead, move the split icon to its own column (see my other feature request "Add disclosure triangle to show/hide detail of a split transaction"). Then, in the category column, show "Split" as is done now, in grey (to indicate it is a default value). However, allow the user to provide a category for the transaction to be applied to the balance remaining from the split.

Thus, a user could then categorize the paycheck balance as "Paycheck : Net Pay" or similar, and budget for this amount without the need to fully budget all paycheck deductions.

Similarly, for those who record a Mortgage payment as a split, this might provide a way to provide an aggregate category for the total of the payment.

I.e., my mortgage payment is recorded as a split with 3 transactions:

- Transfer:[House Escrow] / Transfer to House Escrow
- Home:Mortgage Principal / Transfer to BofA Mortgage
- Home:Mortgage Interest / Transfer to BofA Mortgage

If the split were categorized instead as "Home:Mortgage Payment", then it could be budgeted as a single item. However, this sort of thing would require additional logic to ensure there is no double counting in reports.

NotACPA

Some terminology needs to be clarified here.

- Transfer:[House Escrow] / Transfer to House Escrow
- Home:Mortgage Principal / Transfer to BofA Mortgage
- Home:Mortgage Interest / Transfer to BofA Mortgage

In Q, a "Transfer" is from one account, managed in Q to another.

SO, your Escrow is indeed a Transfer, and you show it as such with the Square brackets.

BUT, the Principal payment is ALSO a transfer and, likewise, should be in Square brackets.  Do you have your mortgage loan set up in Q?

Lastly, your interest payment is an Expense ... NOT a Transfer ... but you have shown it correctly as not having Square brackets ... it's just the description that's misleading.

pheller

Hi, thanks for your response.

Yes, I have setup my mortgage in Quicken, and linked it to the bank account. And after reviewing the setup, there was definitely some confusion. I was not using the payment that the mortgage account setup, but rather one that I created on my own. I've fixed that and it's aligned with what you describe.

Nevertheless, I think the original feature request is still valid. Specifically, you can't budget transfers, so with this payment setup like this, you can only budget your Mortgage Interest payment.

If you could assign a category to the balance of a split (be it "Paycheck : Net" or "Home : Mortgage Payment", etc) and if the balance of the split was thus visible to the budget on that category, it would simplify budgeting for those who want to track splits for tax purposes.

Just my thoughts on it, happy to hear comments, criticisms, or refinements of the idea.

prag

From time-to-time I have needed the ability to:

1. To split transactions between two accounts (i.e Credit Card and Cash). For example, splitting categories (i.e. Tax:Sales and Dining) between a credit card and gift card balance that is managed in a separate cash account.

2. The ability to search for transactions across multiple files (i.e. previously archived files for individual years from 2009 to present). For example, search Quicken files (CY2019+CY2018+CY2017+2016+CY2015) for transaction where I purchased a battery for my car--needed for warranty purposes.

3. The ability to search Quicken files by two criteria (i.e. category & keyword). For example, search where Category=Auto:Service: and keyword=battery.

jacobs

prag said:

From time-to-time I have needed the ability to:

1. To split transactions between two accounts (i.e Credit Card and Cash). For example, splitting categories (i.e. Tax:Sales and Dining) between a credit card and gift card balance that is managed in a separate cash account.

If the gift card is in a separate account, the only way to reflect this is two separate transactions. You can do it with a Transfer if you wish. For instance, if you go to a restaurant and the bill is $100, of which $0 is paid on a credit card and $50 on a gift card, you could enter one transaction in your credit card account like this:



This records a $50 transaction on your credit card and a $50 reduction in your gift card, with the full $100 categorized as a Dining expense. (Or you could record two $50 transactions in each account, both categorized to Dining.)

I'm not sure why you'd want to break out sale tax, unless you itemize your deductions and use your actual sales taxes rather than the IRS table, which is rare. But if you do, you can just expand the entry to include a split for sales tax. So let's take the transaction above and break out $10 of sales tax and $90 of dining expense from the $100 transaction:

prag said:

2. The ability to search for transactions across multiple files (i.e. previously archived files for individual years from 2009 to present). For example, search Quicken files (CY2019+CY2018+CY2017+2016+CY2015) for transaction where I purchased a battery for my car--needed for warranty purposes.

I don't think they will ever add the capability to search in multiple Quicken data files at once. Quicken is designed to keep all your data in one file. (I have transactions going back 3 decades in my data file.) This is why Quicken Mac doesn't offer an ability to separate a data file into different years. They may or may not add such a capability in the future, but if they do, I doubt there will be any way to search multiple data files at once. Quicken is designed to have only one data file open at a time, and it would require a complete architecture overhaul to be able to have multiple files open, as well as a user interface to present data on oner screen which comes from different data files.

If you want the capability to search across multiple years, I'd ask why you're doing whatever you're doing to split out years? I understand if you save a file at calendar year end, to have an archival copy of what your Quicken looked like as of the end of the year. But if you're creating a copy of your file and then manually deleting data from prior years, that process is painful and prone to many errors -- why jump through all those hoops? You can easily filter both transaction registers and reports in Quicken Mac by a specific year if/when you don't want to see older data. 

prag said:

3. The ability to search Quicken files by two criteria (i.e. category & keyword). For example, search where Category=Auto:Service: and keyword=battery.

I agree that being able to specify two search criteria would be useful. I find you can usually get what you need with a search followed by a sort, but it's not quite as easy. For instance, in your example above, I'd probably search for Memo/Notes=battery, then click on the Category heading to sort by category so I could see just the battery entry(ies) within the Auto category. If you need to print the results, you can then just select the Auto transactions which are grouped together, and when you print, select "Selected Transactions Only".

My sense is that the developers try to balance added functionality against not making the interface too complex for users. Currently, Search defaults to all columns, or you can restrict it to a specific column. there's no way to specify multiple columns, nor to specify two separate search criteria.  It might require a somewhat complex screen to be able to select the fields to search and what to search for, but building such a Search capability is certainly do-able. I don't think I've seen this as an Idea post -- the way we users can request new functionality -- on this forum, so you might want to submit that one.

(I'd add that the other capability that is sorely missed is when you're building a Report rather than a Search: we can't currently use Memo/Notes as a criterion for a Report. We can specify specific Accounts, Categories, Payees or Tags, but can't specify text from the Memo/Notes field.)

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This ALL said, I don't think any of these issues you've brought up relate to the original request in this thread, which related to wanting to be able to somehow categorize the net amount of a split transaction. Unless I misunderstood it, I don't see that idea been practical based on the way categories work in Quicken.

Quicken Anja

Hello All,

This idea seems to have fallen stagnant and due to the age of the request and lack of user votes/comments, will be archived within the next 7 business days.

If you would like to see this idea kept alive and considered for possible future implementation in Quicken, be sure to add your vote and a comment explaining how this idea would be beneficial for you.

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Thank you,

Quicken Community Support Team