Incorrect Balance When Selecting Transactions on Register

System

This discussion was created from comments split from: 'Action' field is blanking out after entry in register.

fritzngertie

I believe that this is a bug - When I am looking at the register and want to select some records to get a total for those records the balance displayed is incorrect if I change the filtering of records on the top left of the screen to something other than "All Dates". The default is "All Dates" and it works properly. If I change the "All Dates" to say "This Year" the balance displayed is incorrect. All of the date filterings do not work except for "All Dates".

Quicken_Julio

Hi @fritzngertie,

Thanks for taking the time to post to our Community.

I would like to gather some more information to better assist you:

How old is your data file?

How many account registers experience this same issue?

I would suggest validating your file if you are experiencing unexpected data when choosing a date range other than "All Dates" in your Register.

First, let's back up your file by going to File > Backup and Restore > Back up Quicken File.

Next, we'll create a copy by going to File > File Operations > Copy > OK. Once the copy is complete, choose Open New Copy.

In the new copy, go to File > File Operations > Validate & Repair > check the box for Validate File > OK.

Review the Data_Log.txt for messages pertaining to the quality of your data and resolve any that are advised with instructions you should follow. Close and relaunch Quicken. Attempt to change the date range and verify if the balance displayed is correct.

Responding with the outcome of the validation will give us better insight with the issue and the next steps to take. Look forward to hearing from you.

Frankx

Hi @fritzngertie,

If you are in a register and use the three (3) filtering fields at the top, the on-screen results will be filtered, BUT the Online Balance and the Ending Balance (at the bottom of the screen) do not change because they are the "Current" balances.  That behavior is correct.

If you want to see totals of different filtering of transactions, you should use the "Reports" Tab and sort the data accordingly.

Let me know if you have any followups.

Frankx

Rocket J Squirrel

In QWin, to see the total of a set of transactions in a banking register, simply select those transactions using the mouse to Shift-click or Ctrl-click. Quicken will display the sum at the bottom left.

[It is not clear whether we are talking about QWin or QMac here, as I think some posts got merged into a single thread.]

Rocket J Squirrel

I'm trying to understand the problem. If you have selected a set of transactions and then change the date filter, it forgets your selection and you have to re-select. If this isn't the problem, please come back and elaborate, @fritzngertie .

Chris_QPW

I actually passed up answering this one because I can't reproduce the problem.  As such I think @Quicken Julio comment is probably the best shot at it unless there is something we are missing.

But let me state a few things.  Firs off by @fritzngertie 's profile this is a problem encountered in Quicken Windows and most likely the reason it was branched off of the Mac thread is because it is about Quicken Windows not Mac.

Next I take the problem to be the amount calculated when you select multiple transactions, like the number shown in @Rocket J Squirrel's first post.

But I tried all kinds of combinations of filtering and the value calculated was always correct for me.

fritzngertie

Thanks to everyone who responded to my question so quickly. Sorry for taking so long to get back to you. Rather than trying to reword my issue, I decided to see if a picture is worth a 1000 words. :-) I have attached 2 images that show what I am referring to. These images of the register show just 3 transactions. However, there are about 1500 transactions in this account. The account has been set up for about 3 years.

To Quicken Julio, I did the file validation as you suggested and looked at the log and there were no errors. I still have the running balance problem.

To Frankx, Sorry to be confusing. I was just referring to the running balance on the right side of the register.

To Rocket J Squirrel, I didn't know about the use of the mouse and shift-click or ctrl-click. Thanks for the tip. I have been waiting for Quicken to have something that parallels Excel (mouse click and highlight) totaling.

Chris_QPW, This is a Windows Quicken issue.

Thanks again for all of your insights.

fritzngertie (Don)

NotACPA

I noted that, in the 2nd picture, the progression of the Balance is correctly getting more negative thru the 3 transactions ... and getting more negative by the correct amounts.

This suggests to me that there's something prior to "This Year" that's involved.

@fritzngertie,  can you try setting the date to prior years, successively, and see what happens?  No need to  post photos, just a description will suffice. 2 to 4 years should be sufficient.

BUT, to  me, this looks like a data corruption issue.  SO, have you tried a SuperValidate?  Same process as a regular validate ... but hold down both  the CTRL & Shift keys from when you 1st click FILE until you see the message "Supervalidating" on your screen.

Rocket J Squirrel

Both photos show a register filtered by "xxxxxx". I think this is the salient detail and is probably what's screwing with the balances.

This may indeed be a bug, I haven't dug into it yet. But it does appear to affect the running balance in some unclear way. I doubt, though, that this indicates data corruption.

PS: The photos are blurry. I suggest learning to use a screen shot capture program. My favorite is GreenShot, but you can use the default Windows Snipping Tool if you prefer.

Chris_QPW

Thanks Don for the screenshots that makes it a lot clearer of what you are talking about. 

Lots things going on here.  For instance you didn't mention that you are also filtering with the search box.

And now that I look at it, I see that somewhere along the lines Quicken Inc changed how the balance works.

There has been a long standing argument on how the running balance should be calculated.  The "old Quicken party" says "The register is a report, the balance should be the sum of the register/what is showing".  The "new Quicken/MS Money party" says that the running balance should reflect the balance that is at their financial institution as in even though some transaction are being hidden they should still affect the balance".

And to make it even weirder they seem to have it doing two different things trying to cater to both depending on the filtering.

It seems with "All Dates" they are doing "old school".  As you are filtered down to 3 transactions -0.02, -0.04, -0.01, and that is exactly what the running balance is summing up.  BTW it important to note that below it shows 3 Transactions with no total.  There isn't any total shown because the running balance shows the total.

Now when you switch to "This Year".  The first thing to notice is that the balance on the first transaction is now -2251.03 is being calculated "new party" method.

If we remove the first transactions amount we get a starting balance of -2251.01.
If you clear all the filtering including the xxxxx from the search, and then look at the balance on 12/31/2019, I'm sure you will find that it is -2251.01.

Now mind you I'm not saying any of this is "correct" or for that matter "wrong".  I'm just saying what it is doing and some of the motivation of why they have done what they did.

I think does emphasize that trying to "keep the balance of the hidden transactions" is a complicated thing to try to do.

fritzngertie

Thanks again to everyone who spent time working on my issue.

Chris_QPW, you described what was happening precisely. My 12/31/19 balance was as you noted. The way that you explained the "Old" and "New" methods of determining the running balance makes perfect sense for satisfying both methods. Being an old "Data Processing" guy, I always coded programs (running on IBM 360's and Univac 9200's [I told you that I was an OLD "Data Processing" guy]) to display the total of the items listed on the display or report. We found out early on that if the total was anything but what was listed, we would spend a lot of time explaining to users why the total appeared wrong but was correct. Hence, that is why I thought that I discovered a bug.

NotACPA, Thanks for pointing out the Supervalidate process. I will keep that in mind.

Rocket J Squirrel, I will check out Greenshot and Windows Snipping Tool.

Everyone, Please stay safe!

Don