how to finish off a credit card account reconciliation without affecting another account?

Rick Pula

I've been reconciling credit card accounts for years. However I want to make a change this year and am not sure how to do it. When you click finish, after it asks if you want to do a reconciliation report, a box pops up asking if you want to do a check. It only allows actual accounts to pick from such as a checking account. Can I reconcile without having to answer this box question? If I answer "manual check" it asks for me to assign a account to pay from and then it automatically makes a transaction deducting funds from that account. I no longer want to answer this and not have any payment type information affect the reconciliation. Is there a way to do this??

UKR

I don't have a credit card account in my file which I can reconcile right now, to check the options available on this "Do you want to make a payment now" dialog?
But there definitely is a "No, do not pay now" or similar option that you can choose.

splasher

I'm not sure what I do differently than you, but I never get asked if I want to run a report or to write a check.

I do Ctrl+R, then enter the statement end date, 0 for both charges and payments and finally the statement balance.  No offer for a report and no offer to make a payment.

Rick Pula

yes I too dont have one to reconcile right now. I will pay particular attention on my next one and see how if matches all of the comments I get. I will update when i do the next one. I'm trying to eliminate a checking account that the handwritten check goes to and clean up my account page.. Thanks for the input so far

q_lurker

You also have the option on the Print a check? prompt to no longer see that prompt at the end of the reconcile.  I think that is why @splasher does not get so prompted.  @Rick Pula will likely want to take that path also.    

Rick Pula

Yes lurker, that is where I am confused. You can do a printed check or handwritten check. That is the window that comes up to finish the reconcile. I dont use printed check and usually select handwritten. then you must pick and account from which the money is deducted. It asks if you want to pay the bill this way. I tried selecting "no" and It just showed the items reconciled and the payment didnt come from anywhere. I did it again and assigned my checking and it deducted as a "acct to acct" In my checking when I pay a credit card, I used several categories to assign the costs. So what i had to do is go back into the checking account and do a ctrl S to initiate a split and assign the categories. I did want the payment to come from the checking account. so it doesnt look to be a easy 1 step process. If you are right, maybe the best way is to answer "no" when it asks if you want to pay the bill and then go to my checking acct and label in the payment with the split categories. (since I would have to do that anyway.) I just paid a bill and just put in the checking acct (handwritten check) and then went back to the checking and put in the splits.

q_lurker

@Rick Pula  Why are you splitting the payment as it comes out of your checking account?  

Rick Pula

"q". my checking account is broken up into about 30 main categories by which I prepare a budget (manual). So yes the only way I just figured this out would be to reconcile the account and let it post a transaction to my checking account and then I would go in an change to the categories. I run balances in each category so that each always has its current balance, ie: Gas $100, Electric $500, Auto Insur $350 etc. I can do a total by category and know my on hand balance for each category. A little non standard from the normal post expense and the pull up expenses. That tells you what you spent(whcih I can still get) but each category is routinely deposited into upon pay period and appropriate expenses allocated thus leaving me always with a $ balance of funds for each category. I hope this explains it a bit.

q_lurker

So you have cobbled together some version of an envelope budget system and having the expenses in the cc account is not enough. You have to double-count the expense first when you charge it to the credit card then again when you pay the credit card. 

You have clearly thought through what you need. Carry on is all I can offer. 

Chris_QPW

You should be able to select the "Don't show me this screen again." in that dialog.
Note I tried this and it looks like you have to answer "Yes" to the dialog for it to record the fact that you selected "Don't show me this screen again."  So you will have to accept one bad entry and delete it.

splasher said:

I'm not sure what I do differently than you, but I never get asked if I want to run a report or to write a check.

I do Ctrl+R, then enter the statement end date, 0 for both charges and payments and finally the statement balance.  No offer for a report and no offer to make a payment.

What you "do different" happened in the past.
And note this only applies to credit card accounts.


Once you select "Don't show me this screen again" the only way you will see it again is if you select:
Edit -> Preferences -> Alerts & Messages -> Reset Quicken Warnings

And for all it is very easy reconcile again to test things like this.  Just go to one transaction and change its clear status to c instead of R, and then run reconcile.

Chris_QPW

P.S. The setting for running a Reconcile report is:
Edit -> Preferences -> Notify -> To run a reconcile report after reconcile

Besides being able to turn it off and on here there is a similar dialog option when finishing a reconcile (Don't show again ...), but unlike the "make payment" this option is one of the ones that is "visible" and can be changed individually from this preference dialog.