How do I get Quicken to report discrepancies in One Step Update?

NebularNovice

Because I happened to be looking at a fund website, I have just discovered that the number of shares in Quicken does not match the number in the account on the fund website. For some reason a dividend transaction was reported twice. That is easy to fix. My question: why does Quicken not report that each time I do a One Step Update?

If I go into the account on Quicken, I can specifically ask for a share reconciliation, and it will report the discrepancy. Do I have to do that for every Account? Can I have Quicken check all accounts and report any discrepancies?

Quicken Windows Deluxe

Sherlock

To have Quicken to compare the holdings after downloading to an investment account, I suggest selecting the account in the Compare Portfolio window:  select Edit > Preferences...

gooddog50

You can also, go into Tools > Online Center, pick the account you want and compare Portfolio.  That will tell you if there is a discrepancy. 

NebularNovice

> @Sherlock said:
> To have Quicken to compare the holdings after downloading to an investment account, I suggest selecting the account in the Compare Portfolio window:  select Edit > Preferences...

Thanks for the prompt reply. Unfortunately all accounts, including the one where I know there is a problem since November 2019, are checked for "Compare account portfolio after download". I believe that should mean placeholders should be created when a mismatch is detected, but there are no placeholders in that account.

It would be ideal if that setting created a warning each time a OSU download did not match the Quicken holding, but it is not doing that.

NotACPA

A dividend is an income transaction.  "Compare portfolio" compares share quantities.

SO, how was that dividend recorded? Did you reinvest it?

NebularNovice

> @gooddog50 said:
> You can also, go into Tools > Online Center, pick the account you want and compare Portfolio.  That will tell you if there is a discrepancy. 

Thanks for the pointer to that method. It is essentially a different way of comparing each account individually. I can do that, but I was hoping for a way to get Quicken to do it automatically for all accounts as part of or after a One Step Update.

NebularNovice

> @NotACPA said:
> A dividend is an income transaction.  "Compare portfolio" compares share quantities.SO, how was that dividend recorded? Did you reinvest it?

The dividend was reinvested which is why the share balance is incorrect. I am not as interested in why the duplicate occurred as I am in why Quicken does not report the mismatch in the resulting share balance in the Quicken account vs the correct share balance.

Sherlock

NebularNovice said:

> @Sherlock said:
> To have Quicken to compare the holdings after downloading to an investment account, I suggest selecting the account in the Compare Portfolio window:  select Edit > Preferences...

Thanks for the prompt reply. Unfortunately all accounts, including the one where I know there is a problem since November 2019, are checked for "Compare account portfolio after download". I believe that should mean placeholders should be created when a mismatch is detected, but there are no placeholders in that account.

It would be ideal if that setting created a warning each time a OSU download did not match the Quicken holding, but it is not doing that.

If Quicken hasn't created or offered to create placeholder transactions, there should be no difference between the number of shares obtained from the financial institution and the shares held in the account in Quicken.

NebularNovice

> @Sherlock said:
> If Quicken hasn't created or offered to create placeholder transactions, there should be no difference between the number of shares obtained from the financial institution and the shares held in the account in Quicken.

I agree. No placeholder transactions SHOULD mean no difference between actual shares shown on fund website and shares shown in Quicken. However there IS a difference. When I go to the Online Center and click on Compare to Portfolio for that account, the Securities Comparison Mismatch window pops up showing Shares in Quicken 2.651 more than Shares Reported.

Sherlock

NebularNovice said:

> @Sherlock said:
> If Quicken hasn't created or offered to create placeholder transactions, there should be no difference between the number of shares obtained from the financial institution and the shares held in the account in Quicken.

I agree. No placeholder transactions SHOULD mean no difference between actual shares shown on fund website and shares shown in Quicken. However there IS a difference. When I go to the Online Center and click on Compare to Portfolio for that account, the Securities Comparison Mismatch window pops up showing Shares in Quicken 2.651 more than Shares Reported.

If you have checked the Show hidden transactions preference and reviewed the account register and found no placeholder transactions, I suggest you try coercing Quicken into recalculating the account: https://www.quicken.com/support/recalculate-investment-register

If the issue persists, you may want to review: https://www.quicken.com/support/advanced-data-file-troubleshooting-correct-problems-quicken-windows

NebularNovice

Show hidden transactions is set. The ribbon at the bottom of the register says Placeholder Entries (0). I take that to mean there are no placeholder entries in the file.

Further, if the correct placeholder entry was there, the number of shares would be adjusted by that entry to the correct number shown on the fund website.

I followed the instructions in your first link. It had no effect on the account or results. (One of the links in that page is 404.) I did an update of the account, no message or placeholder. When I do the reconcile shares on the dropdown, it does report the discrepancy, but not until I do that.

I noticed something totally bogus: When I click Details in the Securities Comparison Mismatch window, it tells me ""Quicken has 2.651 more shares than your brokerage for <the fund> and it has been more than 90 days since you last downloaded from your brokerage." It hadn't even been 90 seconds since the last download!

I looked at your second link, but it told me its actions weren't appropriate for my symptoms.

Sherlock

NebularNovice said:

Show hidden transactions is set. The ribbon at the bottom of the register says Placeholder Entries (0). I take that to mean there are no placeholder entries in the file.

Further, if the correct placeholder entry was there, the number of shares would be adjusted by that entry to the correct number shown on the fund website.

I followed the instructions in your first link. It had no effect on the account or results. (One of the links in that page is 404.) I did an update of the account, no message or placeholder. When I do the reconcile shares on the dropdown, it does report the discrepancy, but not until I do that.

I noticed something totally bogus: When I click Details in the Securities Comparison Mismatch window, it tells me ""Quicken has 2.652 more shares than your brokerage for <the fund> and it has been more than 90 days since you last downloaded from your brokerage." It hadn't even been 90 seconds since the last download!

I looked at your second link, but it told me its actions weren't appropriate for my symptoms.

I wouldn't trust the Placeholder Entries tab count at this point which is why I said you should review the account register.

Regarding the 404, I hope you sent your feedback to the support center.

The instructions on how copy the Quicken file are available on the second link.

The second link does not say its actions are not appropriate.  

Note:  The account update status is maintained in the runtime.dat file within a Quicken file specific folder in the hidden \ProgramData\Quicken\Inet folder.  I suggest you exit Quicken, rename the runtime.dat file, open Quicken, examine the One Step Update Summary to confirm you have renamed the appropriate runtime.dat file. If all goes well, you may remove the renamed file.

NebularNovice

I didn't just trust the tab count. I did review the register.

I don't know how to report a bad link. I see no facility for that on the 404 page where I expected it.

The second link target gives a list of symptoms and says validation will not help if you don't have those symptoms. I have none of those symptoms. The other steps have been checked out (except that there is no Reset button in the register).

Sherlock

NebularNovice said:

I didn't just trust the tab count. I did review the register.

I don't know how to report a bad link. I see no facility for that on the 404 page where I expected it.

The second link target gives a list of symptoms and says validation will not help if you don't have those symptoms. I have none of those symptoms. The other steps have been checked out (except that there is no Reset button in the register).

To report the bad link, select Not Really where asked Was this article helpful? toward the bottom of the page:




Investment registers don't have Reset buttons.

Personally, I would still attempt the Copy and Validate instructions and, if the issue persists, contact Quicken Support as the guidance suggests.

NebularNovice

Didn't think to report on the previous page. Got it.

That copy and validate has been done multiple times for other reasons during the 16 months the duplicate entry has been causing the Quicken file to report an incorrect number of shares with no placeholder entry. That was actually the primary reason I didn't do that again. (The last several times, no errors were discovered.)

I'll check with support to see whether they have a suggestion. Thanks.