Account Not Listed in Transfers

After the initial setup of pulling in my account info from the banks, my car loan was appropriately placed in the "Property and Debt" section on left side of screen. However, when I enter the transaction from my checking account to pay the car payment, the auto loan account name does not appear in the "Transfers" section of the category prompt. In other words, the auto loan account is not an option that I can indicate in the category in order to transfer the payment to the auto loan account and reduce the balance.

I tried to edit the auto loan account to see if there was something I could change but I did not see anything.

Les

Best Answer

  • Tom Young
    Tom Young SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    Answer ✓
    Because you set up your loan as a "downloading" loan, i.e., connected to the loan servicer, you have no access to the loan's register.  You can make no entries into the loan Account itself.  Instead the loan servicer will update the loan's balance after the payment is processed and the entry for the paydown will "magically" appear in the loan Account.  I use the word "magic" here because the entry will be "one sided" in that no other Account in your file - specifically your checking Account - will be affected.  So you need to make an entry to what's really a "Category", (Quicken-speak for and income or expense) in order to post your payment out of the checking Account.  I believe the default Category to use here is "Loan Payment:Principal."
    Of course posting a reduction of a loan balance without affecting cash is wrong, and expensing the principal portion of a payment out of the checking Account to a Category is wrong, (it should be a Transfer), but here's one of those situation where two "wrongs" make a "right."
    If you want to have access to the loan Account's register directly you need to convert the loan from "downloading" to "manual."

Answers

  • Frankx
    Frankx SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    Hi @wlmpilot,

    Sorry that you are having this problem.

    When you are attempting to enter the transaction in the checking account register - and in the "Category" field - enter a beginning square bracket ( which is this symbol  [   ).  The field should then show a list of all your accounts that can accept a transfer transaction.  You can then start to type in the name that you gave to the loan account, or use the down arrow symbol, to get to the correct account.

     Let me know how that goes, or if you have any followups.

    Frankx

                            Quicken Home, Business & Rental Property - Windows 10-Home Version

                                             - - - - Quicken User since 1984 - - - 
      -  If you find this reply helpful, please click "Helpful" (below), so others will know! Thank you.  -

  • Tom Young
    Tom Young SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    Answer ✓
    Because you set up your loan as a "downloading" loan, i.e., connected to the loan servicer, you have no access to the loan's register.  You can make no entries into the loan Account itself.  Instead the loan servicer will update the loan's balance after the payment is processed and the entry for the paydown will "magically" appear in the loan Account.  I use the word "magic" here because the entry will be "one sided" in that no other Account in your file - specifically your checking Account - will be affected.  So you need to make an entry to what's really a "Category", (Quicken-speak for and income or expense) in order to post your payment out of the checking Account.  I believe the default Category to use here is "Loan Payment:Principal."
    Of course posting a reduction of a loan balance without affecting cash is wrong, and expensing the principal portion of a payment out of the checking Account to a Category is wrong, (it should be a Transfer), but here's one of those situation where two "wrongs" make a "right."
    If you want to have access to the loan Account's register directly you need to convert the loan from "downloading" to "manual."

  • wlmpilot
    wlmpilot Member
    Frankx,

    I cannot figure out how to reply directly to your comment but using the "[" did not work. However, I believe Tom Young's response is what I am going to have to do.

    Thank you both for your time and response.

    Les