Creating Renaming Rules the Easy Way

emarzock

I swear I've experienced creating renaming rules by clicking on certain keywords within a downloaded transaction to assist in the renaming rule creation. But, I can't seem to figure out where that dialogue box is.

What I want to do is point to a transaction that's been downloaded, revert it to the downloaded payee name if needed (I am using Quicken's recommended payee names). Then, from that transaction, easily create a naming rule by clicking on a few keywords within the downloaded payee name, enter in the name I want to rename to, and click Done.

As I said, I know I've seen this done within Quicken. Just can't figure out how to launch that dialogue again. (Quicken for Windows subscription).

q_lurker

When I type over an existing downloaded payee and 'enter' the transaction, this type of renaming rule box pops up
 

That allows me to build a new renaming rule clicking on the keywords as desired (USPS, PO, or 1950160584 in this case), "Click all that apply".  Other than that process when first processing the downloaded transaction, I don't know of a way to get this box.  

q_lurker

As I said, the only time I get it is when first working on a newly downloaded transaction.
Auto-enter downloads OFF
Select transaction in Download list - it shows in transactions list
Edit name in transaction list - Enter
Up pops that box.  

Chris_QPW

There is no such function (keyword selecting), but you might be mistaking what you think you did for this option:
Edit -> Preferences -> Automatically create rules when I rename payees
(and you probably want the "confirm" option on too)

Note that since Quicken's renaming rules are "contains" this "similar" to "entering keywords".

swamiperk

All of my cleared check say the same payee (it used to say "check." - I'd sure love to see a program which read the payee for me, but that may be greedy, right?) Then in memo, it states some strange address...not even for that company. What really slows me down is when I hit the floppy ( save), up pops "edit renaming rule," expecting me to input each time. I hit cancel, but that's another step each time. Any suggestions?

Chris_QPW

In general for checks you write the financial institution doesn't read the payee, and as such doesn't pass such information on to Quicken.  You need to either to pre-enter the checks and match them. Or change them after downloading.

For this kind of thing I have a renaming rule that ensures they just come in as "Check" and a Memorized Payee with no category, which is locked, so that it won't change when I change the payee name and category.  I don't write many checks so this is fine for my use case.

emarzock

@Chris_QPW , Thank you for your response. I know I'm not crazy, and I don't mean to be argumentative. However, I do honestly remember recently clicking on keywords within payee to create a renaming rule. For example, there's a renaming rule that I created that, in summary, if the payee contains XXXXX2104, then rename the Payee to Transfer to X2104. I do not remember typing "XXXXX2014." Rather, I sincerely believe that I just clicked on that attribute.

I'll move on if there's no other corroboration to my experience. But, man, that's weird.

Chris_QPW

Well I don't rename payees very often so I certainly could have missed it.
At any rate I can't help in that case.

q_lurker

When I type over an existing downloaded payee and 'enter' the transaction, this type of renaming rule box pops up
 

That allows me to build a new renaming rule clicking on the keywords as desired (USPS, PO, or 1950160584 in this case), "Click all that apply".  Other than that process when first processing the downloaded transaction, I don't know of a way to get this box.  

emarzock

That's the exact dialogue box that I was remembering. I notice that it says "Create Custom Renaming Rule." I can't get that one to fire, no matter what I try. Thanks for confirming that I'm not crazy!!!

q_lurker

As I said, the only time I get it is when first working on a newly downloaded transaction.
Auto-enter downloads OFF
Select transaction in Download list - it shows in transactions list
Edit name in transaction list - Enter
Up pops that box.  

NotACPA

Chris_QPW said:

In general for checks you write the financial institution doesn't read the payee, and as such doesn't pass such information on to Quicken.  You need to either to pre-enter the checks and match them. Or change them after downloading.

In general, your bank can only see what's on the MICR line of your checks.  Only if they're doing a "Signature Verification" does a human ever bother to look at your signature or the payee.  There's just too many documents going thru for there to be any human intervention.

At the bank were I previously worked (before moving to Audit there), my check processing system handled 9,000,000 documents an hour (2,500 a second for you math geeks).

Chris_QPW

Just for the record what threw me off is in the original post you talked about clicking on keywords.  There's no such process like that but yeah there's always been the dialogue for confirming that they're going to create a renaming rule for you.  Note that you need to look in the preferences that you have, not only to create renaming rules automatically when you get a new payee but also that it has the confirmation on it so it doesn't do this just behind your back and you don't see it.

And I will note that this has nothing to do with whether automatic transaction entry is on or off it has to do with are you encountering a new payee that there's no renaming rule for during your download.

q_lurker

And I will note that this has nothing to do with whether automatic transaction entry is on or off 

Thanks for that clarification.  I was trying to indicate that in my case, it is off, just in case that was an applicable criterion for someone trying to duplicate it.  I fear I left ambiguity..    

Mystic Hill

I came here looking for the magic that brings up the "Create Custom Naming Rule" dialog. Editing the Payee is not the magic, unfortunately I have to do that every transaction. The dialog came up when I Memorized the payee. Essentially all of my payees have already been memorized, fortunately you can force Quicken to re-memorize a payee.

I still need to do this a few more times to make sure I've found the secret sauce. I wish editing the payee would be enough when that option is selected in Preferences.

Mystic Hill

Nope. Tried again, didn't work.

How do you bring up the automatically generated renaming rules?

Chris_QPW

@Mystic Hill as far as I know the only time the automatic generate renaming rules are going to come up is after downloading transactions.  In other words, you download a transaction, and it has no current renaming rule and as such gets whatever was downloaded (or what Quicken picked if you have "Automatically apply Quicken's suggested name to payee" on). Then you go in and change that payee.  That is when the dialog will come up.  At any other time, you have to invoke the renaming dialog manually.

EDIT: and just in case you don't know you can get to it using:

Chris_QPW

Another person reminded me that you also have to have the "confirm option" on too to get the dialog, because if you don't have that on, Quicken will create the renaming rule without asking you.

Here is his post:

In my tests, the criteria for getting the option to Create (or Edit) a Custom Renaming Rule are:

- The Quicken Preferences to "Automatically create rules when I rename payees" and "Let me review/confirm the automatically created rules" are selected.

And

- The transaction whose payee is being renamed was downloaded. 

Even if the transaction was downloaded/accepted (or also renamed) long ago, if the Preferences are set and you modify the payee of a downloaded transaction, you should get the Create/Edit dialog allowing you to control the rename.