Entering paycheck as split vs. "Paycheck Wizard"

sbaird32

When paychecks are entered via the Paycheck Wizard, they show up with a Category of "--Paycheck--". I guess I'm wondering if there is any functional difference between this and a paycheck entered manually as a regular "--Split--" transaction? I have a bunch of history imported from MS Money where paychecks were just treated as ordinary splits, and this difference annoys me. I'm wondering why paychecks are handled so specially by Quicken. Couldn't it just be an ordinary split transaction? I get that the wizard dialog is nice for setting up your preferred categories, etc, but is that the only difference?

Chris_QPW

In the background the paycheck entries are just split transactions.  The only real reason for a paycheck reminder and such is to make it easier for people to enter the data.  Whereas one would have to understand what they are doing for things like transfers to a 401K the paycheck reminder will do for them without them having to know the details.  In fact Quicken Mac doesn't have a paycheck reminder.

If one wants to see the details you can right click on a paycheck entered into the register and select Add a reminder.  And then drill into the split information.

sbaird32

Thanks. I've also gathered that you can use Ctrl+Shift+S to view a paycheck wizard transaction as an ordinary split. This appears to be undocumented.

rockmskm

Thanks for Crtl +shift +S! My employer gave me a credit on my paycheck for an erroneous deduction, but the paycheck wizard will not allow a "negative" deduction. This was the only way I could fix it! And made it easy to adjust for the sad lack of an end date in the wizard.