How to change the default category for downloaded transactions

HellRider

How do you change the default category for downloaded transactions in Quicken? I read a post that said to go to Tools > Memorized Payee List and change it there. However, my Memorized Payee List is empty. Any other ideas?

Thanks,

MGMQcommunity

There are two ways I know of to populate the memorized payee list.
1. Automatically memorize new payees. To do this go to PREFERENCES. Pick "Data Entry and QuickFill". Check the box next to "Automatically memorize new payees".
2. Go to an existing transaction. Right click. Choose "Memorizer Payee." You can also get to the same place by clicking on Edit > Transaction > Memorizer Payee.

Chris_QPW

Note one #2 from @MGMQcommunity's comment.  Ctrl+M is shortcut for  memorizing a payee.

Also #1 is probably the way to go if you are just starting out, but I have found that once I have pretty much every payee I regularly use properly setup for with a renaming rule (if needed) and a memorized payee, that I like to do it manually.  That is my personal preference.

MGMQcommunity

My method of managing this uses Renaming Rules, Memorized Payees and Preferences settings for Downloaded transactions (Edit > Preferences > Downloaded transactions). Take Whole Foods for example:

1. I use Renaming Rules to change the payee for the downloaded transaction to "Whole Foods" whenever the transaction contains "Whole Foods" or "WholeFoods", etc.

2. I have a Memorized Payee for Whole Foods that sets the category to always be "Groceries". (You can automatically create memorized payees as you enter data (See Data Entry and Quickfill under Preferences) or you can go through your existing data and add existing Payee/Category relationships to your Memorized Payee List. My habit is to set the amount and memo data to be blank and I lock the records in my Memorized Payee List.)

3, Then, under Preferences for Downloaded Transactions. I specify the settings I want. A PDF showing the settings I use is attached.

Use of Renaming Rules and Memorized Payees works best with occasional review and maintenance of both lists.

I just googled "relationship between renaming rules and memorized payees" to look for previous discussions about this. There are previous conversation about this topic. It will probably be useful to read other discussions.

HellRider

Part of the problem appears to be that my Memorized Payee List is blank. Any ideas why that would be?

MGMQcommunity

There are two ways I know of to populate the memorized payee list.
1. Automatically memorize new payees. To do this go to PREFERENCES. Pick "Data Entry and QuickFill". Check the box next to "Automatically memorize new payees".
2. Go to an existing transaction. Right click. Choose "Memorizer Payee." You can also get to the same place by clicking on Edit > Transaction > Memorizer Payee.

Chris_QPW

Note one #2 from @MGMQcommunity's comment.  Ctrl+M is shortcut for  memorizing a payee.

Also #1 is probably the way to go if you are just starting out, but I have found that once I have pretty much every payee I regularly use properly setup for with a renaming rule (if needed) and a memorized payee, that I like to do it manually.  That is my personal preference.

MGMQcommunity

Good points. I also like to lock the memorized payee and make amount $0 and memo blank. The memo is especially important to prevent populating an incoming transaction with memo from a previous transaction.

Chris_QPW

MGMQcommunity said:

Good points. I also like to lock the memorized payee and make amount $0 and memo blank. The memo is especially important to prevent populating an incoming transaction with memo from a previous transaction.

I do the same, but I will point out that for downloaded transactions the memo in the memorized payee can't override what the financial institution sent (provided you aren't manually entering transactions).

See this:
https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7890935/common-suggestion-for-blocking-memo-downloading-doesnt-work

HellRider

All, thank you for your answers. I don't if I'm misunderstanding or not doing something correctly. I'm still having the issue. For example, when transactions are downloaded for my Amex card, Amazon.com always defaults to Beauty for the Category.

I changed the the Category to Household and then Memorized the transaction. The next time Amazon.com appeared, it defaulted again to Beauty.

Also, my Memorized Payee List is blank.

What am I not doing correctly?

Chris_QPW

HellRider said:

Also, my Memorized Payee List is blank.

That sounds like a bug in Quicken, not what you are doing.
Try this: https://www.quicken.com/support/error-memorized-transaction-list-full-or-memorized-transactions-stop-working

COLORADO GAL

Is there a way to always leave a category blank for a certain payee- for example Amazon- sometimes it is office supplies, beauty, auto etc. so that it has to be filled in for each transaction? Or am I better off always putting Amazon (for example) into its own category and manually categorizing each transaction? any other suggestions

Chris_QPW

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20424285#Comment_20424285

Yes, there is (and that is exactly what do for Amazon):