Import CSV file for transactions

Graminal

December 16, 2021

Mr. Eric Dunn
CEO
Quicken, Inc.
3760 Haven Ave Ste C
Menlo Park, CA, 94025-1382

Dear Mr. Dunn:

I read with interest your email regarding the recent issues with transaction downloads form Charles Schwab. I appreciate the sentiment of the email, but it does not address the root cause of the problems or the serious impacts to users who have been detrimentally affected.

As I retired CEO of two software companies, I am intimately familiar with all aspects of rolling out new software updates and changes with application interfaces.

Therefore, I find it incomprehensible how a company the size of Quicken could have such poor communication with Schwab so as to allow the recent debacle to occur. There apparently was no beta or pilot program which is a standard industry practice for such a change.

Further, my contact with Quicken support over this incident has been abysmal. Initially, they were completely unaware of the problem and had no solution. They offered an escalation case number and then I was unable to get thorough to anyone on the phone even after horrendous wait times.

The current release seems to have fixed the problem for new transactions. However, a serious issue remains with the transactions that were missed while the problems existed.

Currently, there is no way to recapture and download those missing transactions. Schwab can generate a CSV file for those transactions, but Quicken can not import that file. Quicken needs a QFX file and Schwab does not generate one.

For my situation, I am missing over 200 transactions. Conservatively, at two minutes each, it would take about 6 ½ hours to enter them manually. This is clearly unacceptable.

I am sure I am not the only user in this situation.

The solution is for Quicken to add the ability to import the CSV file from Schwab or to help Schwab generate a QFX file. A file format data conversion program is a simple fix on either end.

I spoke with a supervisor in technical support to relay the above problem and he was not helpful and could only parrot some info from prepared responses to user inquiries.

Given the gravity of the situation, I would hope that your organization would open a dialog with Schwab and solve this issue in a timely fashion.

I have been a Quicken user for over 20 years, and this situation has severely tainted my opinion of the company and its product.

I would be pleased to discuss this issue with a member of your organization with the authority to affect a solution.

I look forward to a favorable response.

Sincerely,

Greg_the_Geek

QuicknPerlWiz - Use ImportQIF to import transactions into Quicken

Works with CSV files as well.

Steve54@

The lack of Quicken csv import has been an annoyance for years. One of my financial organizations only provides pdf and csv files. Does not play with Quicken. Another year has gone by and now I need to enter dozens of re-investment transactions into Quicken. I don't get the issue with entering csv transactions. Yes, I will give QuicknPerlWiz a try. But if a 3rd party can do this why can't the great software folks at Quicken figure out how to do this?

Chris_QPW

Graminal said:

Therefore, I find it incomprehensible how a company the size of Quicken

Just how big of a company do you think Quicken Inc is?
It isn't very big in my opinion.

Note that doesn't excuse them, or Intuit from bad communications/rollout, since I don't think size should dictate that in this case.

Graminal said:

Currently, there is no way to recapture and download those missing transactions. Schwab can generate a CSV file for those transactions, but Quicken can not import that file. Quicken needs a QFX file and Schwab does not generate one.

As I understand it Schwab was generating a QFX file in the past, so if that is true then clearly it was their choice not to keep generating it.  To me clearly, they prize "moving forward" over supporting their Quicken customers.

Graminal said:

The solution is for Quicken to add the ability to import the CSV file from Schwab or to help Schwab generate a QFX file. A file format data conversion program is a simple fix on either end.

Steve54@ said:

The lack of Quicken csv import has been an annoyance for years. One of my financial organizations only provides pdf and csv files. Does not play with Quicken. Another year has gone by and now I need to enter dozens of re-investment transactions into Quicken. I don't get the issue with entering csv transactions. Yes, I will give QuicknPerlWiz a try. But if a 3rd party can do this why can't the great software folks at Quicken figure out how to do this?

When I look at all the problems that Quicken Inc/Intuit have to support what they have already created with Express Web Connect (and now "plus") I can certainly see why they wouldn't want to open the can of worms called CSV.

Column Separated Values.  What about that tells you anything about which columns are where, or included or not?

The first thing you will notice about any CSV converter is that it going to have ask the user what columns map to what fields in Quicken (or in this case the QIF format).

The next thing you will notice for investment transactions is there isn't any standard on the "action" terms.  One financial institution might call it Buy another Bought, another might not even have an action field and might have to scan the description to figure out what kind of transaction this is.

The bottom line is that I'm sure that they would be very afraid that given the option, their support people (and this forum) would have tons more questions on it.

And I also think that there is a money/business part to this.  Currently for QFX imports the financial institution has to be a "participating partner", and I think that at least Intuit wants to keep it that way.