I am having trouble matching downloaded transactions to the register

Question

My bank transactions all have blue pencils, but there are still duplicate transactions without blue dot status icons.

When I right-click on a transaction that has no status icon, I do not receive "Reject Automatic Transaction Match." anywhere in the menu selection

Chris_QPW · Answer

P.S.  Never use automatic transaction entry mode with automatic reconcile.  If you do as soon as the download finishes it will go into the reconcile.  Reconcile is only concerned if the amounts are correct, it doesn't care about things like the payee or categories.  And once a transaction is marked reconciled, the status of New/New Match goes to blank and it will be hard to find them again.

Chris_QPW · Answer

The first thing I recommend is that you expand the Status/Blue dot column by dragging the column header separator to the right.  This will give you the text in addition to the icon which is easier to understand.

The possible values for the Status column are: blank, Uncleared (red pencil), New (blue dot), New Match(blue pencil).

Blank means that the transaction has already been "reviewed" for "correctness".  Unfortunately there isn't any way to change its status back to a "un-reviewed" state.

Uncleared is a transaction that has been manually entered (including entered by a reminder) that hasn't been matched to a downloaded transaction.

New, downloaded transaction that Quicken didn't find a match for.

New Match, downloaded transaction that Quicken match to an existing transaction (and merged the information from the two).

First let me say that Quicken will only match an existing transaction if the amounts are exactly the same.
If the transaction manually entered in the account is different than the one in the downloaded transaction then the amount on the manually entered transaction has to be changed and then you would click on the Uncleared status field and select "Match to downloaded transaction".

The "reviewing process" goes like this.  You scan the transactions to make sure everything is correct like the payees/categories and the matching, correcting ones that are wrong.  You can mark an individual transactions as "Reviewed" by clicking on the New/New Match status and selecting "Mark as reviewed".  That will change that field to blank.  You can also make sure all the transactions are OK and then select one of the status fields and select "Mark all as reviewed".  Note Right click/context menu doesn't have any of the review commands on it (it probably should though).

Clicking on the New Match has an extra option of "Un-match this transaction", which will split the downloaded and manual transaction back out from each other for the case incorrect match.

Another possible flow is to make sure all the transactions are correct and then do a reconcile.  Any transactions that are reconciled will be "marked reviewed"/blank.  Also if you edit a transaction it is "marked reviewed"/blank.

There is another completely different process that is "Accept" instead of "Review".
The default is setup for Review for non investment accounts, but can be changed by turning off this option:
Edit -> Preferences -> Downloaded transactions -> Automatically add to banking registers.

This will only apply to new downloads (you can restore from a backup to start again).

What this does is put a Downloaded Transactions tab at the bottom of the register.
The process is that you click on one of the transactions in the Downloaded Transactions tab and Quicken will show that transaction in the register (if needed you can changed things in the register entry) and then you select the Accept button or Enter to accept it into the register.

Diana Cinamon · Answer

Thank you for your prompt reply. I have Quicken starter ed. Version: r34.20. Build: 27.1.34.20 Windows 10 home.

I have the following choices when I right-click on a status line without a status: save, split, notes and flags, attachments, copy transaction(s) cut transactions(s), edit transaction(s), new, delete, insert transaction, move transaction(s), memorize payee, add reminder, void transaction(s), 
 reconcile status>
      not reconciled
      cleared
      reconciled
 find, go to matching transfer, go to specific date, use calculator.

There is no option for me to chose "Not Reviewed". I can send a screenshot if you want.

I would like to mention that I have been using ms money sunset deluxe and have imported transactions via a .qif file.

Since ms money no longer syncs with my bank, I am forced to move to quicken. There are some very good features with quicken, but some very confusing ones.